


It Ain't Over

by itchyfingers



Series: The It Ain't Over World [1]
Category: Henry Cavill - Fandom, James McAvoy - Fandom, Michael Fassbender - Fandom
Genre: Alcoholism, F/M, Love Triangle, Romance, Starting Over
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-22
Updated: 2013-09-29
Packaged: 2017-12-24 06:45:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 31
Words: 91,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/936646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/itchyfingers/pseuds/itchyfingers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Halla throws away her entire life and is ready to face the unknown. But then she meets Henry. Can she become the person she wants to be and still have a relationship with him?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

There was no possible way the day could have gotten any worse. Her presentation had been savaged by the clients who had completely misunderstood what she was trying to do. Somehow, what she thought was artful and interesting was over the top and pretentious. No, regardless of their claims to the contrary, they didn’t actually want to do anything new and exciting and groundbreaking. They just wanted to claim that the same shite they had been peddling for the last one hundred and fifty years was so old it was new again. That was fine; she’d had clients disagree with her before, but then to go on and claim that as a young woman she lacked the ability to speak to their clientele in a language they would understand made her want to take one of the $400 putters they were advertising and wrap it around their necks. She had managed to keep it together in the board room, though she could still feel the imprints of her perfect manicure in her palms. But now, as she stood in the motherfucking rain waiting for a cab to actually recognize her, she wanted to scream and cry and just swear at all the holy saints and angels for this latest proof that she was completely and totally failing at her life. The pouring rain was just so movie cliché for her despair and she looked around hoping, really  _hoping_ she would see movie cameras somewhere and all this was just the first act in a movie and someone would yell cut, and the rain machines would stop and someone would bring her a triple latte macchiato with caramel or whatever it was that those skinny bitches always ordered in front of her at Starbucks. She hated them. She had never talked to them, but she was pretty sure she hated them.

But there were no movie cameras. There never were. Just like there were no rain machines, and nobody to hand her a cup of coffee, and the pretty girls in front of her at Starbucks were probably lovely women who volunteered for charity and loved libraries and gerbera daisies and watching  _Pretty in Pink_ in their pajamas and singing along with Britney Spears songs non-ironically.

She sighed in relief as a cab pulled up, only to have some asshat in a three piece suit that probably cost enough for a nice vacation slip in front of her and grab it. She didn’t say anything, knowing if she did she would end up facing an assault charge by the time she was done. She took a deep breath and pulled out the bottle of pomegranate blueberry juice from her bag. She twisted off the top and took a drink just as someone bumped her from behind and she spilled it down the front of her pale blue blouse.

She stared down at the enormous stain that continued to bleed into the expensive fabric and gave up. She hated this blouse. She hated the boring conservative color and the boring conservative cut and the boring conservative store she had purchase it at. She’d already snapped the artboards for her presentation in half and dumped them in the bin in the lobby on the way out. She was not about to tote those across London in this kind of weather; the rain would have ruined them anyway. She marched back into the lobby, stripped off her ruined blouse and threw it in the bin as well.

The security guard looked at her in concern, wondering what else the half-drowned, half naked woman in his building was going to do.

“Fuck this job. I hate this job! I hate this job, and this briefcase!” She threw it in the bin. “And I hate this phone full of contacts of people I loathe with every fiber of my being.” She threw the device on the floor with all her might and smiled as she heard the screen crack.  She stomped on it, spearing it with the spiked heel of her shoe for good measure. “I hate my fucking life!” She screamed it at the top of her lungs. The security guard started walking towards her and she smiled. “Don’t worry, that’s it. I’m done. I’m done with all of this.”

She picked up her purse and walked out the bank of cold glass doors at the front of the building.  Not even the pelting winter rain could dull the euphoric sense of relief she felt. She had just thrown away her entire fucking life, literally, and she couldn’t think of anything that would make this moment better.

A taxi pulled up right in front of her,  _like fucking karma_ , and she reached for the door just as someone else did. “Mind if we share?”

Right now she was feeling so good that she would have shared with a leprous neo-Nazi with poorly spelled tattoos and an aversion to oral hygiene. “Come on, get out of the rain.”

She climbed in and slid over the vinyl seat as she gave her home address to the cabbie. Catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror, she pushed her sodden hair out of her face and wiped her smearing eye makeup from under her eyes. She turned to the stranger next to her who was pulling off his soaking knit cap and turning down the collar of his jacket.

“Fuck,” she whispered.

He turned to face her. “Are you alright, ma’am?”

“Oh yeah, just had the worst day of my life, and I finally get to meet you and I look like a drowned sheep-dog in a bra.” She looked down at her chest and the embroidered purple lace. To avoid dying on the spot, she decided to ignore the effect the freezing rain had had on her breasts. “At least it’s a nice bra.”

“Very nice.”

Her head snapped back up to glare at him. He was fighting back a grin.

“Are you making fun of me?”

“No. I make it a rule not to poke the crazy people with sticks.”

She collapsed against the seat with a sigh. The vinyl stuck to her damp skin as she let her head fall back. “I’m sorry. I probably do look crazy, don’t I?”

“Either that, or you’re making a bold sartorial choice and I’m not enough of a fashionista to appreciate it.”

She looked at him out of the corner of her eye. “You probably have someone who picks out your clothes for you, don’t you?”

“Just for the major events. On Thursdays I get to choose my own pants,” he replied with a  perfect deadpan delivery.

She couldn’t help but laugh. “I’m sorry. You got caught in the tailspin of the worst day of my life.”

“Sounds like you’ve had a more interesting day than I have.”

She turned her head so she could actually look at him. “What have you been up to?”

“Radio interviews with stations all over England. I just sit in a booth and they patch them in.”

She made a gagging face. “Sounds horrid. How many times did you tell the same anecdote?”

“At least eighteen.”

“Do you ever just want to lie?” Her face lit up like a little boy who has just put a giant frog in his sister’s bed. “Like make up some giant whopper of a tale, get all your cast mates in on it, and see if you can convince everyone it actually happened?”

His laughter was charming. “That actually sounds brilliant. I’ll have to try it next time.”

“Make it include a puppy. That way I’ll be in on the secret.”

“I’ll do that.” He looked at her curiously. “What’s your name?”

“Halla. And I don’t care how ridiculously good looking you are, if you say ‘Halla back’ I will slap you across your handsome face.”

He started laughing again. “That was a bad summer for you, I take it?”

“I’m still considering suing Gwen Stefani for emotional damages.”

“Well, it’s nice to meet you Halla, I’m–”

She interrupted. “Oh please, I know who you are. I’m pretty sure everyone knows who you are.”

“Just trying to be polite.”

“You boarding school Brits and your manners,” she winked at him.

He looked down at her chest, the first time he had during the entire conversation. “That’s a very expensive looking bra for someone who is not a fan of the posh life.”

“Oh please, I went to Wycombe Abbey.”

He raised a mocking eyebrow. “Ooooh, and you’re going to twit me about a please and thank you? Though I do suppose you’ve managed to keep your skirt on this whole time. That’s a nice piece of polish. You do your finishing school proud.”

She dissolved into giggles. “If only my poor headmistress could see me now, topless in the back of a cab with a perfect stranger. She’d have palpitations. And then she’d say, ‘Halla, I see you still haven’t gotten over your proclivities for inappropriate shenanigans.’”

“Inappropriate shenanigans? This sounds promising.” He tried for a wicked leer, but he was smiling too broadly for it to be convincing.

“She thought putting political t-shirts on the statuary on campus counted as nigh on to advocating the overthrow of the government. I fear you will have to look elsewhere for inspiration for the mass con you will foist upon the movie-going public.”

The cabbie coughed politely. “Here we are, ma’am.”

She looked out the window and saw her house. “Oh, thank you.” She fumbled for her purse, surprised at how fast the ride had gone.

“Listen, I know this is going to sound crazy, but I’ve been talking all day and I’ve enjoyed talking to you in the last few minutes more than the rest of them combined. Would you like to go get dinner or something?”

She looked at him in surprise. “Really?”

“Yeah, I mean, if you want to. No pressure.”

“You mind if I go put on a shirt first?”

He rolled his eyes dramatically. “If you insist.”

She smiled. “Why don’t you come in? You can dry off while I go freak out in my bedroom as I tear through my closet looking for something to wear.”

“That sounds like a plan.”

She handed money to the cabbie and slid out of the taxi. _Maybe this won’t end up being the worst day of my life after all._


	2. Chapter 2

Halla ran up the central staircase in her building, an old converted Victorian that was now four flats, praying to anyone that might be listening that she hadn’t left dirty laundry scattered all over or last night’s dinner dishes on the coffee table. She unlocked the door and peeked inside. She yanked the door shut again and turned to Henry, her back up against it and her hands on either side of the doorframe. “You’re just going to stand here for a minute or two, okay?”

He fought back a smile and nodded. She opened the door just enough for her to squeeze inside and slammed it shut behind her. Henry looked around the small landing while he was waiting. It was clean though the carpet underfoot showed a lot of wear, and the whole stairwell could use a coat of paint. It was an incongruous housing choice for a girl who wore £150 brassieres.  He could hear her running back and forth and cupboards slamming. There was a moment of ominous silence and then the door opened again and Halla smiled sweetly at him. “Hello, please come in.”

Henry stuck his head in the door and eyeballed the small space before he looked at her with a grin. “It safe to come in now?”

Halla’s blush started just above the cups of her bra and went up to the tips of her ears. She became instantly fascinated with her fingernails. “Just don’t look in the bedroom.”

“Or in the oven.”

Her eyes narrowed. “How do you know that, because I am sure you don’t really have x-ray vision?”

“I’m a guy and I live by myself. I’ve done the thirty second cleanup before.” He came inside and shut the door quietly behind him.

Halla stepped back, aware of how small her flat was now that he was in it for perspective. “Towel. You need a towel. Right.”

She opened the bathroom cupboard and was grateful to find clean linens so she wouldn’t be reduced to sniffing the used towels to find out which was the least funky. Handing him the dry towel, the thick cotton terry a little faded and frayed at the edges, she said, “I’m going to go put on some clothes now.”

Halla retreated to her bedroom and fought the urge to sit on her bed amongst everything she had just thrown there and hyperventilate. Instead, she went to her closet and started flipping through the hangers looking for something interesting to wear.

“You’re in jeans, right?” she called out.

“Yes. Did you keep getting distracted by my chest as well and not do the fully body scan?”

She giggled as she pulled a shirt from her wardrobe. “Actually, it was the chin dimple that kept distracting me.”

“It’s amazing how much power the chin dimple has,” he called back. “It’s why 97% of women don’t realize I’m actually missing a leg.”

“And the three percent that do?”

“All have exes with chin dimples.”

“Ah. I do not have an ex with a chin dimple.”

“Well, then I should be okay.”

She came back out in the living room where he was examining her computer setup, hair askew and a damp towel in his hands. She pressed her fingers to her lips to stifle a giggle.

“Are you a gamer?” he asked, without turning around to look at her.

“No, why?”

“Three 21inch monitors, headphones with a mic and an Alienware tower. That’s a setup that screams gamer.”

She laughed. “No, my brother is, and he gave me his old set up when he upgraded a few months ago. Old is subjective with him, though. He gets a new setup every six months or so, it seems. I do a lot of graphic design for my job. Well, I guess I  _did_  a lot of graphic design for my job.” Her voice trailed off. “I should probably go clean out my office tomorrow.”

He turned to look at her. “Redundancies at work?”

“No. I quit. In rather spectacular fashion. Well, I didn’t quit, really, I just got fed up and threw it all away in the client’s lobby.”

“Including your shirt.”

“Of course. It doesn’t count as throwing it all away unless you throw away your shirt, too.”

Henry nodded thoughtfully. “What are you going to do now?”

“I honestly have no idea.” She grinned. “I feel like the world is full of possibilities but I just hated that job so much it was sucking the soul out of me.” She paused, lost in her thoughts, before she looked at him again. “Did you always want to act?”

“Since I was in my teens.”

“Yeah, I never had anything I was passionate about like that, except maybe laying on a beach in the sunshine, and apparently that’s bad for you.” She rolled her eyes.

“You just need to use sun crème.”

“But there’s always that spot in the middle of your back you can never reach by yourself.” She demonstrated with both arms, trying to reach the impossible square of skin and failing, much to Henry’s amusement.

He stepped closer to her, close enough that she realized he had a freckle in the center of his bottom lip. “You just need to bring someone with you to help do your back.”

She looked up at him, only to find that his eyes were fixed on her lips. “You volunteering?”

He hooked his index fingers through the belt loops of her jeans and tugged her even closer, their stomachs touching. “Maybe.”

Her body flushed as warm as if she had been laying out in the sun for an hour, instead of standing in a chilly rain. “So, does this big gorgeous hunk of flirtatious man with the deep sexy voice routine work well for you usually?”

The corner of his mouth turned up in a smirk. “Usually.”

“Huh.” She reached up and smoothed his wayward curls. “Probably works better for you when you don’t look like you should be watching Saturday morning cartoons and eating sugar masquerading as a breakfast cereal.”

“You don’t find the boyish charm endearing?”

“I kind of feel like I’m getting played, actually.”

He stepped back, letting go of her. “I…I’m sorry.”

“I mean, I know you’re probably a really nice guy but I’m sort of realizing that we met while I was in my underwear and then I invited you up to my flat and then the whole laying on a beach thing while you’re standing there in a white shirt and it’s clingy and oh, god, I’m making a complete idiot of myself, right?”

She covered her face with her hands. “Feel free to run away now. I’ll understand.” She lowered her hands several seconds later and he was leaning against her computer desk, watching her with amusement. “You didn’t run away.”

He shook his head. “No, I typically don’t run away from cute girls.”

“But I’m an idiot.”

“It will help if you forget I’m famous.”

“How am I supposed to forget you’re famous? I named one of my vibes af…” Her mouth snapped shut and her eyes widened in horror before she closed them as realization dawned in his face. “Yeah, so this is just topping off the worst day ever and I can’t even go stick my head in the oven because it’s full of dirty dishes, so I’m going to go hide in my bedroom and please don’t steal anything on the way out.”

She turned around before she opened her eyes. She didn’t want to see his laughter or embarrassment or disgust at her accidental admission. She took two steps before she felt his hand on her shoulder. “That’s the most memorable compliment I’ve ever been given on a first date.”

“Memorable compliment being the polite way of saying the most bizarre words ever to leave a woman’s mouth.” His hand was big but gentle, too. He wasn’t forcibly restraining her, just trying to calm her.

“No, I’ve gotten worse.”

“Really?” Her disbelief was obvious.

“Yes. You would not  _believe_  the questions people asked me about the Superman suit.”

“You looked good in the suit,” she admitted quietly.

“Thank you.” He walked around so he was standing in front of her. “Listen. The rain is coming down in curtains. Why don’t we just get some take-away and we can sit here and talk rather than us going to some fancy restaurant and you thinking I’m playing you.”

“So is this the reverse play, now?” She fiddled with the button on his shirt, too embarrassed still to actually meet his eyes.

He took a deep breath. “Not a play. Let’s just pretend we met at the market, and I chatted you up at the butcher counter and talked you into having dinner with me; just a guy asking a girl out on a date. Do you think you could do that with me?”

“So we’re going to pretend you are normal.”

“I’m fairly certain I am normal.”

“Even if you weren’t a famous actor, I don’t think anyone would ever classify you as normal, Henry.”

“And why is that?”                                                 

“You’re big and handsome,”

It was his turn to interrupt. “And you’re little and cute. I’m failing to see the problem here.”

She didn’t say anything. She used to be the girl that took every leap without looking and here she was panicking about a possible date with a gorgeous guy. Was it possible to excavate who she used to be out from the detritus of the life she had just thrown away?

He stroked his hands up and down her arms. “You’re much more nervous than you were in the taxi. Is that because of me or that I’m in your flat or is it just that the adrenaline from quitting your job is wearing off? I feel like I’m doing something wrong here, and I’m not sure how to fix it.”

The concerned lines between his brows gave Halla a sickening lurch in her stomach, as if everything wrong that had happened today was just a precursor to this moment of embarrassment and guilt. She had flirted with him and then accused him of playing her when he flirted back. She leaned forward and kissed him. She didn’t turn it into anything other than a simple press of lips on lips, but it was easier than trying to explain everything racing through her head.

Henry cupped her face gently in his hands and pulled back a few inches to look at her. His thumbs touched the soft skin in front of her ears and his fingers worked their way into her wet hair. She felt how much bigger he was than her, not just his hands but the width of his shoulders and the way she fit between his arms.  His breath was warm as it feathered across her lips. He leaned in, paused, smiled as she leaned in towards him. He still didn’t kiss her, the heat of their skin touching each other first, breath like a caress, noses brushing against each other, before he finally nudged her face a few degrees upwards and kissed her.

Ten seconds at the most. His mouth was warm as it moved against hers, slow and tender. It was an introduction, a greeting, an offer of something more as their lips interlaced and she forgot about the button on his shirt and rested her hands against his chest. The steady rise and fall calmed her, and the nervousness drained away, replaced by a floating calmness, buoyed up by his touch with the warmth of his skin bathing her like the sun.

When he pulled back, again it was just a few inches. “Better?” he asked, looking into her eyes.

Halla nodded.

“Not nervous anymore?”

“Not as much.”

“Good.”

She stepped back. “I threw my mobile away along with everything else. Why don’t you call for take-away and I’ll go dry my hair so I can stop dripping on things.”

“You in the mood for anything in particular?”

She could barely remember her own name right now much less pick a restaurant. “You choose.” She retreated into the bathroom and shut the door behind herself and took her first deep breath since he had kissed her.


	3. Chapter 3

Halla exited her bathroom to find Henry sitting at the computer playing a game. “How long was I in there?”

Henry turned around with a guilty smile. “Not that long. I just wanted to see what games your brother left on here.”

She walked over to him to see what he was playing. She peered at the screen, trying to make sense of the array of multicolored displays and moving figures. “What is this?”

“ _World of Warcraft_.”

She smiled in amusement as she braided her hair, mostly to have something to do with her hands. “I take it you’re a gamer, then?”

He looked up at her, watching her fingers rapidly weave her pale blonde hair. “Yes, and I’m a little jealous that you aren’t but you have a better setup than I do.”

Halla chuckled. “Give me a couple of weeks without a job and I’ll sell it to you to make rent.”

His brows narrowed in concern. “Are things going to be that stretched for you?”

She shrugged and looked out the window, not wanting to have to think about serious issues right now. “It depends on how helpful my parents feel like being.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

The compassionate tone in his voice made her look at him. “You can pay for dinner.” She smiled. “I don’t think you can help with my parents.”

He took her hand from where it was fiddling with the end of her braid and held it still. “I was planning on paying for dinner. I did ask you out, after all.”

“Well then.” The warmth of his hand was very soothing, like bathing in a tiny puddle of sunlight. “Show me what you’re doing in this game.”

“I’m just running some quests.”

“Is that guy you?” She pointed to the figure in the glowing armor with the huge shield and sword.

“Yes.”

“So what is he?”

“He’s a pally. A paladin.”

She thought for a second, her mouth twisted to the side. “Holy soldier guy?”

“Right.”

She watched for a minute. “So you just run around and whack things with a stick?”

“It’s a bit more complicated than that, but yes.”

She watched a bit more. “I’m not seeing why this is entertaining.”

“Well, let’s roll you up a character and you can try it for yourself.”

“What? No.” She took a step back from him.

“Come on.” He smiled up at her and held out his hand. “You try it and if you don’t like it then you can mock me mercilessly.”

She squinted at him in her best impression of irritation. “Fine,” she said dramatically, with a huge heave of her shoulders and took his hand.

He tugged her back up so she was standing next to him while he logged on to the internet and got a free trial code and then said, “Okay, let’s set you up an account.”

A few minutes later he asked, “Do you want to be Alliance or Horde?”

“What does that mean?”

“They are the different teams.”

“Which one are you on?”

“Alliance. All humans are Alliance along with Nightelves, Dwarves and Gnomes.”

“Okay, I’ll be Alliance too.”

“Now you need to pick a race.”

She leaned over his shoulder to look at the options. “These are cool looking.”

“Come over here so you can see better.” He took her hand from his shoulder and pulled her around in front of him.

She clicked the mouse a few times. “Oh, the gnomes are cute! I want to be a gnome.”

Henry laughed. “You are such a girl.”

“You didn’t seem to be complaining about that a few minutes ago when you were kissing me.”

His hands closed around her waist and he pulled her down on his lap. “I’m not complaining about it now, either.”

“Well, good, because I am very much a girly girl.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I love pink and glitter and high heels and flowers and sparkle and…” She trailed off. “You get the idea.”

“I think I can deal with that.”

“Well, good, because it’s part of the package.”

He grinned at her, a smile that quirked one corner of his mouth. “I like your package.”

She shook her head as she laughed. “You are  _such_  a boy.”

“I am.” He nodded. “Computer games and baseball caps and fast cars.”

“You’re not all boy though.” She gnawed at her bottom lip as her eyes focused on the stubble coating his square jaw and the dimpled chin. “I think you have more muscles than your computer guy.”

The game was forgotten as the hand she had on his shoulder tightened. “Only when I’m in full Superman build.”

She very obviously looked him up and down slowly, and then looked him in the eyes again. She bit at her bottom lip again, a flush coloring her cheeks. “I don’t know, I think you look pretty big right now.”

He ran his finger across her bottom lip, tugging it free from her teeth. “I get bigger,” he whispered.

She shuddered as little bursts of lightning shot over her skin. “I’m sure you do,” she murmured, the trail of his finger across her lip practically glowing. They stared at each other for the space of a few long breaths before she turned back to the computer monitors and started clicking on the different options. “What’s a mage?” Her voice was shaky.

He cleared his throat a few times, his hand clenching on the curve of her waist. “Like a wizard. They cast spells, do a lot of damage, but they die pretty easy.”

“So I can have a wand?”

“Or a staff.”

“Oooh, that’s cool.” She clicked a few more times. “I can have pink hair!”

Henry laughed. “Yes, you can have pink hair.”

“This is like playing with dolls.” She turned to Henry, “You realize you’re just playing with dolls, right?”

His chin lowered as he looked up at her from under his brows. “I normally don’t spend that much time customizing my character.”

Her laughter bubbled up and spilled over him, leaving him awash with the desire to hear her laugh again. “Uh-huh. You’re totally playing with dolls.”

His lips pursed. “Hit the next button.”

She giggled and then clicked a few more times. “I can have Princess Leia hair. Pink Princess Leia hair!”

He reached for the mouse. “That’s it, we’re done playing.” She could hear the laughter in his voice but responded as if he was serious.

“Noooo,” she snatched it away as she turned to look at him, her eyes wide. “This is fun.”

He slid his arm further around her waist. “Fine. Keep going.”

A few more clicks later and Nikala, a pink-haired mage gnome entered the game. She was standing in a tiny little encampment surrounded by fields of sparkling snow and beautiful pine trees.

“Why don’t I have cool clothes like you do? I want glowing clothes.”

“You have to earn those.”

She looked at him, biting her lips together to keep from laughing as she struggled to gain control of herself. “Are you telling me,” she put her hand over her mouth, but he could see her grin in her glowing cheeks, “you play the game to get cool clothes?” The laughter escaped in spite of her best efforts to contain it. “This is  _totally_ playing with dolls. Is there a Ken gnome around here? Do I get a dream house and a car?”

He raised an eyebrow at her, and she tried to school her face into a more serious expression. “No. But you can get a motorcycle.”

“Oh,” her eyes lit up, “where do I get one of those?”

“You have to be level 75 I think.”

She paused. “I’m only level one, right?” She sounded disappointed.

“Yes, you start at level one.”

“Okay,” she sighed, her shoulders slumping, “so here I am in my ugly outfit. What do I do now?”

“You see the guy with the big exclamation point over his head? Go click on him.”

She clicked on the man and a dialog box popped up. Henry watched as she read through the information and she clicked on ‘accept.’ “Okay, now what?”

“Now you go do what he told you to do.”

She turned to look at him, her eyes narrowed skeptically. “So I just run around doing what people tell me to do? This seems about as boring as real life.”

“Just wait.”

“Fine, so I go run over where?”

Henry navigated her character to where she needed to be. “Now you have to fight these people.”

“Why?”

“Because they stole stuff from the person who gave you the quest.”

“But what did they do to me?”

“Nothing, but you said you would help the guy who gave you the quest.”

“I didn’t realize it meant I would have to kill people.”

“Well, you have to get back the stolen goods. If you can manage to get them all without getting caught, then you don’t have to kill anyone.”

“Where are the stolen goods?”

“See that chest that sparkles?” He pointed to a stack of boxes and bags with a dwarf standing close by.

“Oh, okay.”

Halla very carefully edged up to the chest and clicked on it and the nearby dwarf immediately started attacking her. Halla screamed and frantically slapped the mouse repeatedly. “Stop hitting me!” She tried to run away but within a few seconds was dead, the previously crystal bright images fading to shades of grey, her corpse lying in the middle of a field of snow.

Halla scowled at Henry who was doing his best not to laugh. “I don’t think I like this game.”

“You’re adorable when you pout.”

“Yeah?” She stuck her bottom lip out a little further.

“Yeah.” He wrapped his free hand around the back of her head and tugged her towards him. She offered no resistance, instead sliding her arms around his neck and leaning into him. Henry gently nipped at her protruding lip. “Absolutely adorable,” he murmured before he kissed her. He could feel his pulse in his throat as his arm tightened around her waist, drawing her even closer. The background music of the game faded to be replaced by the sound of their breathing becoming more erratic as the need for air became secondary to the feel of lips moving against each other. Driven by the same impulse, their tongues grazed each other for the first time just as the door buzzer sounded.

Halla slowly pulled back, her fractured breath sounding loud in the sudden quiet left behind after the shrill buzzer faded. Henry ran his thumb across her bottom lip, causing her body to quiver. “Absolutely adorable.”

She didn’t know what to say, so she stood, fiddling nervously with her braid that was already coming undone.

Henry stood and smoothed his shirt down. “Hold that thought,” he said and went to go pay for dinner.


	4. Chapter 4

Halla went into the kitchen to get dishes for the food. She grabbed a few glasses from the drainer and then stopped. She didn’t know if Henry was an ‘eat out of the containers’ person or ‘dish it all out’ person. It occurred to her she didn’t even know what they were eating. She called out, “Do you want to eat in here or in there?”

“Why don’t we eat in here?” he called back. “I’ll just put it on the coffee table.”

“Okay. What do you want to drink?” She opened the fridge and stared morosely at the pitiful contents. “I’ve got water, lemonade, milk, and some flavored kefir thing I bought to try and haven’t been brave enough to open yet.”

“Do you have a beer?”

“No, I don’t keep alcohol in the house, sorry.”

“You don’t?” He came and stood in the doorway to the kitchen, practically filling the space with his large frame.

“Nope. Living by yourself and a bottle of vodka in the freezer is a bad combination. Have a bad day at work and you end up drinking the whole thing.”

He chuckled. “So what do you do when you have a bad day at work?”

“Quit, apparently.”

He laughed and she wanted to pinch his cheeks. Somehow he shifted from thirty year old man to six year old boy when he laughed like that. He took the glasses from her hands and took them into the living room. “Seriously though, if we hadn’t shared a taxi, what would you be doing now?”

She grabbed the pitcher of water from the fridge and followed him. “Painting my toenails, probably, and watching _Clueless._ ”

He looked at her feet. “They’re already painted pink and sparkly, though.”

“I could paint them a different shade of pink.”

He took the pitcher of water from her and filled the glasses. “I can’t remember the last time I dated a girly girl.”

Halla’s breath hitched at his off-handed statement. “Are we dating?”

“First dating?”

She nodded. “First dating.” Halla opened one of the containers sitting on the table. Dumplings. “Do you want chopsticks or a fork?”

“Chopsticks.”

“Ooooh, points in your favor.”

She retrieved two sets of chopsticks and rests and a few saucers and dipping bowls and brought them out to the table. She grabbed a pillow off the sofa and tossed it to Henry and then dropped another one on her side of the table and sank down onto the blue microfiber fabric. She arranged the little dishes and then started opening the containers.

“I’ve seen restaurants that don’t have dishes this nice.”

She looked at the small enameled bowl he was holding. “I love tiny dishes. You might assume it’s because they’re cute and little, but really it’s because I can fill them up five times and not feel like a cow when I’m done eating.” She looked at the array of dim sum spread out in front of her. “Something tells me you love food as much as I do.”

“Tiny little you?”

She raised an eyebrow at him in challenge. “I may not be an athlete, but if eating were an Olympic sport, I would win _all_ the medals.”

He snorted. “As long as it’s not a co-ed competition.”

“You think you can out-eat me?”

“Uh, yeah.” He nodded sharply in emphasis. “Superman is going to out-eat Barbie.”

“Oh, it is _on._ ” She picked up a _shaomai_ with her chopsticks. “You are going _down_.”

She bit into the dumpling right as he said, “If you’re lucky.” She laughed and then realized she had a mouth full of food. She tried to stop laughing so she wouldn’t make a mess, but her inhale of breath fought with her giggles and she started to choke as a piece of prawn lodged in her throat. Henry didn’t realize she was actually choking, thinking that she was just laughing with her hand over her mouth, until she started turning red in the face.

“Oh, shit.” He jumped to his feet and scrambled towards her. She frantically turned her back towards him and he smacked her as hard as he could between the shoulder blades. Nothing happened and he grabbed her around her stomach, put his fist at the juncture of her ribs and then used his other hand to propel it upwards with all the force he could muster.

She gasped for breath as he dislodged the dumpling. She heaved for breath and grabbed a napkin from the stack on the table and spit out the rest of her food before it met a similar fate. She took a few more deep breaths and cleaned her hand on another napkin as her heart stopped racing and regained its normal pace.

“Are you alright?” Henry still had his arms around her.

She leaned back against him. “I’m pretty sure trying to kill your opponent is against the Olympic spirit.”

He chuckled softly and handed her a glass of water. “I think I get a technical foul or a yellow card or something.”

She sipped the water, letting the chill soothe her throat as the strength of his chest against her back soothed something else entirely. Finally, she said, “Well, I guess I can pay my rent by selling my story. ‘Superman tried to kill me and then punched me in the stomach.’”

“Does it hurt? I didn’t break a rib or anything did I?” His hands stroked over her rib-cage.

“No, no broken rib. But remind me never to get you mad enough to punch me. I’m pretty sure I’m going to have a bruise in the morning.” She rubbed her hand over the tender spot where he had pushed.

“I would never punch you. I don’t care what you were doing, I wouldn’t hurt you.”

She turned her head so she could look at him, surprised at the serious tone in his voice. “I know.”

“Do you?” His eyes were laser focused on her face.

“Yes.” She could only whisper in response to the intensity.

“Good. I’m fairly traditional in a lot of ways,” he smoothed his hand over her braid, “and one of them is that I treat women like ladies.”

“Unless you are trying to kill them in Olympic eating competitions.”

“Of course, except for then.” His increasingly familiar grin was back. “There’s an exception to every rule.”

Halla found herself drawn to his mouth. The combination of his hard square jaw and the soft curve of his lips short-circuited her brain. She finally looked up at his eyes. She could see that he had noticed the lapse in her attention. “I’m going to try and eat again. I’d appreciate it if you don’t make me choke this time.”

“I’ll see what I can do. And to be safe, I’m going to stay sitting next to you so you’re in easy reach just in case you manage to inhale a rice ball or something.” He grabbed another pillow off the couch and arranged it next to hers.

They managed to get through the rest of the dinner without incident. Halla was left-handed so they didn’t bump elbows as they ate, but ended up holding hands instead.  

She picked up a piece of fried squid. “So, if not girly girl, what _is_ your normal type?”

He rubbed at this throat, nervous about the flow of the conversation. “More athletic, I guess. My ex-fiancée did equestrian showjumping, and the girl I dated after that was a mixed martial arts specialist.”

Halla’s eyes widened in surprise. “I am officially scared of your ex-girlfriend. The breakup was mutual I hope?”

“What, you don’t think I could protect you from her?”

“I don’t know.” She looked at him doubtfully. “You did say you’re not at your Superman weight.” She snagged the steamed meatball he was reaching for and popped it in her mouth.

“Even if I’m not at Superman weight, I think I’m still big enough to keep you safe.”

She gave him a skeptical once over. “Hmmm, hopefully we won’t have to find out.”

“What’s your normal type?” He held out a taro dumpling to her and when she reached for it, he yanked it back and ate it.

“Stealth arsehole.” She made a loud gagging sound.

“Ah.” He nodded, his lips pursed together. “There do seem to be a lot of those.”

One corner of her mouth lifted in a sneer. “It does seem to be an easy one to attract.”

His thumb stroked over the back of her hand. “And has this colored your view on men in general?”

“Like, do I assume you’re a douchecanoe until you prove otherwise?”

His brows narrowed. “A what?”

She held a hand over her mouth as she chewed and swallowed. “Douchecanoe.” She enunciated each syllable carefully.

He got distracted by her full lips moving so precisely and had to force himself to pay attention to the conversation. “I’ve never heard that term before.”

“I find it amazingly descriptive, considering I’m not sure what it actually would be. It’s just one of those words that sounds bad. I mean, you don’t even need to speak English to know that being called douchecanoe is not a good thing.”

He mouthed the word. “Yes, I believe that would be true.”

“Though douchecanoe is more of a state of being, whereas arsehat is more of deliberately being a malicious jerk.”

“I’ve never heard arsehat, either.”

“Well, Stowe or Harrow or wherever it was you went has been sadly remiss in your education.”

His chuckle made her smile. She loved that sound and knowing that she could make him laugh.

“Yes, I can only insult someone in Shakespearean English or classical Greek.”

She giggled and picked up a _char siu baau_. “Don’t worry. Stick around and I’ll teach you all sorts of things.”

“I would reply to that comment, but I don’t want you to choke again.”

They teased each other through dinner until the food was almost all gone.

“Oof, I feel so fat,” Halla said, laying down her chopsticks.

“Do you concede?” Henry asked, reaching for one of the last slices of turnip cake.

“I think I did pretty good considering you’re twice my size and I’m not wearing my fat jeans.”

“Even your fat jeans are skinny jeans, Halla.”

She let go of his hand and sprawled backwards, laying on the floor between the coffee table and the sofa. “Look,” she said, and pulled her shirt up to reveal her belly as she laughed. “I’m six months pregnant.”

He looked at her bare stomach, barely curving from the meal she had just enjoyed, the low rise of her jeans showing several inches of skin below her navel. “You know what I think?” His voice had dropped an octave.

The palms of her hands and the soles of her feel went ice cold and then prickled from a flush of heat. “What?” her voice quavered.

He pushed the coffee table away so he had room to move and crawled towards her, his eyes fixed on her face. “I think,” and he paused before quickly dropping his head and blowing a raspberry on her stomach.

She erupted in laughter and grabbed at his head. He followed up by tickling her exposed stomach as she bucked and writhed on the floor, giggling as s­­he tried to grab his hands. “Stop,” she finally gasped, and he immediately let go of her and sat back.

She looked up at him in surprise. “You actually stopped.”

“You said to.”

She poked him a few times in the arm, confusion lines appearing between her arched brows. “Are you the same species as my brothers?”

“I don’t know. Do they come from the planet Krypton?”

His grin was quickly becoming her favorite thing about him, and it made her feel like champagne, little bubbles of happiness racing through her blood. “You are such a nerd.”

“I am. But I’m also a gentleman.”

Her eyes flickered and she looked away from him. “I didn’t think you were going to be a gentleman there for a moment.”

“When?” He rested his hand gently on her stomach. She fought the urge to suck in her tummy, knowing the movement would be obvious, but she couldn’t feel her hands or feet as all of her focus was sucked to the touch of his surprisingly smooth hand against her skin.

“Before you blew a raspberry on my stomach.” He wasn’t aware that people could blush on their stomach, but it and her cheeks took on the hue of her painted toenails. “You looked like you had something else on your mind.”

“Like what?” His voice was soft and intimate, and he ran his fingertips slowly over her stomach, holding back a smile at the way her eyelids fluttered and her next words were a little unsteady.

“Having me for dessert.”

He shook his head slowly, watching her react to his continued explorations of her stomach. “Not on a first date, sorry. You’ll have to make do with the other Henry tonight.”

“Charles,” she interjected.

“You named it Charles?”

She sat up and pulled her shirt back down. “I was watching _The Tudors_ when I bought it. You were a randy little bastard, weren’t you?”

He laughed. “Couldn’t keep his dick in his pants for anything.”

“Yeah.” The tips of her ears turned bright pink. “I may have watched some of your scenes more than once,” she admitted, barely loud enough for him to hear. She found herself fixated on the button on his shirt, the one right in the middle of his sternum.

“Which one was your favorite?” He wasn’t sure whether to feel smug or embarrassed.

“My favorite scene of you? Any time you were in that chased plate armor you were pretty sexy.” She fiddled with the button, keeping herself distracted from thinking about what she was discussing.

“And of the scenes where I wasn’t in armor?” His head was next to hers, so he was practically whispering in her ear.

“I don’t know.” Her own voice was a whisper as well. “You grew up in that show. You were this hot little punk at the beginning, and it would have been fun for a roll in the hay or a romp in the sack or whatever you want to call it,” he tilted her face so they were looking at each other, “but by the end when you were with your mistress, it seemed like you were actually capable of love which was equally hot, just in a different way.”

“And now you’re wondering which one I’m more like in real life, and what my interest in you might be.”

She could feel the warmth of his skin under her hand, evident even through his shirt, and his steady calm heartbeat, in contrast to hers which was racing erratically. “How did you know?”

“I can read your mind.” He grinned and she felt herself responding in kind. “If I was interested in just a roll in the hay, I wouldn’t have tickled you, Halla.” He kissed her softly, just for a second, unable to resist her slightly parted lips.

“So what are you interested in?” She was interested in his button again.

“You. You fascinate me and make me laugh and confuse me and I would love to see you again.”

She smiled but couldn’t make herself look up at him. “I would like to see you again, too.”

“Not that I want to leave right this instant, unless you want me to go, of course.”

Her eyes flew up to his. “No, stay, we can watch a movie or something.”

“Or you can try _World of Warcraft_ again.”

Her eyes narrowed. “You’re talking, but your words don’t make any sense.”

“Right, movie it is, then.”


	5. Chapter 5

Halla was proud of herself for making it halfway through the movie before she kissed him. He was surprisingly comfortable for as muscular as he was. Her fears that it would be like using a rock for a pillow as she leaned against him were happily whisked away as he put his arm around her shoulders and she found herself enveloped in a warm embrace.

It was crazy how comfortable she felt with him. She’d known him just a few hours and here she was in her flat, lights dimmed, resting her head against his shoulder, her hand on his thigh, his fingers absentmindedly brushing against her arm. The rain continued to pelt against the windows, adding another layer of grey insulation between her and the rest of the outside world, filled with worries about how she was going to make rent, telling her parents that she had quit another job, and continuing in her critically acclaimed role as family fuck-up.

All of that was gone as he held her. This was the part of her that got her in trouble, her willingness to plunge headfirst after each new flashy toy that popped up in front of her, and yet she couldn’t make herself care. He was warm and funny and smelled good and was so handsome that sometimes it hurt her stomach to look at him. He’d saved her life, which was pretty good for a first date, even if he had been the one to endanger it in the first place. He hadn’t pushed himself on her. He’d even helped clean up dinner without being asked. He was definitely not a douchecanoe. Or if he was, he was one of those fancy stealth ones that couldn’t be picked up by normal girl radar.

She clamped her eyes shut and covered them with both hands during a bloody scene – he had been shocked that she had never seen  _Gladiator_ so they were streaming it – and he took the opportunity to undo her braid the rest of the way while she was hunched forward, her knees pulled up to her chest, as if by making herself as small as possible she would be able to avoid even more of the gore flashing across the screen. He combed his fingers through her hair and then began to rub his fingertips against her scalp.

“Oooooo, you can keep doing that.” She wriggled happily.

Henry smiled at the cute little noise and the way she moved like an excited puppy. “Do you want to watch something else?”

“No, we can keep watching this if you keep doing that.” She turned her head, guiding his fingers to spots he hadn’t yet touched.

“You seem to enjoy having your hair played with.”

She could hear the amusement in his voice. With her eyes shut, the feel of his hand in her hair doubled. She was as relaxed as if she were taking a bubble-bath in hot tea. “If I ever get to be rich and famous, I’m going to have someone wash my hair for me every day. Like, one of those girls from the salon that do the whole scalp massage and use their fingernails and everything. It feels so good.”

He gently scraped his short nails against her scalp and she shuddered. “Does someone wash your hair for you every day when you’re on set, or do you do that yourself?”

“No, they leave basic hygiene up to us to take care of.”

“Hmm, pity. Guess I won’t become an actor then.” She giggled again, the sound making her back shake.

She sat quietly as he rubbed her head, continuing to relax under the steady caress. After a few minutes, he quietly said, “Did you fall asleep?”

She smiled before she opened her eyes and sat up, stretching her arms over her head as far as they would go before she looked at him. “No. I probably could have though. You’re very soothing. If it hadn’t been for you being here this evening I’m sure I would be freaking out right now.”

He reached for the remote and paused the movie. “What can I do to help?”

“You don’t need to do anything. I’ll figure it out.”

He turned to face her, resting a hand on her knee. “Are you sure? What do you want to do? I know people who know people. I could maybe put a word in for you.”

“That’s the problem. I don’t know what I want to do.” She twirled a lock of her hair around her finger. “I feel like I should have this figured out by now, but apparently I am a failure at being an adult.”

He gently squeezed her leg. “You’re not a failure at being an adult.”

“Are you sure? Because dim sum and dressing dolls on a computer is the most I’ve enjoyed myself in months.” She paused for a second and then she gasped at her oversight. “And you, of course,” she said, her eyes widening slightly, upset that she may have offended him.

He brushed a finger down her nose. “Of course.” He paused for a second and then said, “Have you ever considered being a stylist?”

“Like, for hair?”

“No. The person who dresses celebrities. It’s the closest thing to getting paid for playing with dolls I can think of at the moment.”

She shook her head. “I didn’t think that there were a lot of opportunities for that.”

“Well, sometimes it’s not what you know, it’s who you know. If you want, I could put a few feelers out. The pay probably sucks at the beginning, but then any entry job is going to have that problem.”

Her mouth fell open in surprise. When she recovered herself, she said, “Why are you doing this for me? You barely even know me.”

“I like to help where I can.”

She let out a little breath of relief. “It’s like you’re a real life superhero. I could kiss you.”

“Yes, you could.”

His satisfied smirk made her giggle but the urge to laugh disappeared the moment she pressed her lips against his. He cupped her face in his hands as they kissed, pulling apart after each one to look at each other as if they weren’t sure yet that the other one was quite real, noses brushing against each other, sharing breath as well as touch. He caught her bottom lip between his teeth, suckling it and the sweet warmth of his lips mixed with the tang of his teeth and made her moan. She pulled free of his bite and returned the touch, nipping at the full flesh of his mouth. She wanted him, needed him, with an instant intensity she didn’t understand but was willing to let guide her. The flash of lightning outside the window matched the spark of desire she felt shoot through her body, setting her nerves alight.

His mouth moved on hers, needing to taste more of her. Henry tightened his arms around her and she sighed against his lips. He flicked his tongue against her lips and she parted them for him, clambering onto his lap, her thighs on either side of his. His hand slid down her back, cupping her rear and bringing her closer to him. His other hand tightened in her hair, the slight pull of her follicles sending shivers down her neck and dancing down her spine. Halla nipped at his lip, the heat stirring inside her like a lightning strike setting a wildfire ablaze, tearing through her like the flames were being fed by gusts of wind.

Another flash of lightning threw the room into bright relief, bleaching the color from everything, even the blue of his eyes as he looked at her, pupils flaring in the interrupted darkness. He wanted to see her, study her, understand why she made him act like a teenage boy with no self-control. His hands clenched on her waist as the thunder crashed overhead, and he could feel the soft give of her flesh. She was soft, so soft, fragile and delicate under his fingers and it made him want to meet the softness of her body with his own hardness, and the sparkle of her spirit with armor to protect it. She rubbed her hips against him, not a grind, not yet, but a soft touch, inviting him and he could not decline. His hands fell to her hips and rubbed her harder against him as he kissed her neck, the warm skin delicate under his mouth. He sucked gently and she moaned, the sound rushing through his veins like quicksilver.

As soft and comforting as he had felt earlier when she had relaxed against him, he was hard and unyielding now. Henry’s chest pressed against hers as his hand splayed across her back, holding her against him. She wasn’t the only one who liked their hair played with, she discovered, as she ran her hands into his hair and let her nails scratch against his scalp. Halla giggled at the blissed out look on his face as she let his hair slip through her fingers.

Her hands tightened in his hair as she rolled her hips, pressing harder, and she felt him push up against her. The lightning flashed again, noticeable only as a flare of light against her closed eyelids and the thunder crashed almost immediately, before the after-echo of the blinding light had faded. Halla ground against him again. She could feel him responding, the thrust of his hips, the hardening in his jeans, and she rolled her hips another time. His hand fell to her arse, squeezing and pulling her tighter against him. He left his hand on her bum, kneading her, rocking her against him, holding her so there was resistance when he pressed up against her gyrating hips.

He gathered her hair together, wrapping it around his hand and tugged, pulling her head back as he kissed down her neck. The sweet arch of her throat encouraged him to linger, slow warm open-mouthed kisses down her skin, licking the hollow at the base of her throat, over the slender chain from which dangled a tiny gold star. He mouthed at the swell of her breast through the thin cotton of her shirt, and felt her fingernails dig into his shoulder.

“Henry,” she moaned, and the sound was like a shot of adrenaline. He needed her more than he could comprehend. He turned, laying her down on the couch. She looked up at him, her breath coming in shallow pants across the perfect bow of her lips, her blue eyes half hidden by her lashes. He lowered himself over her, one hand by her head, the other skimming under her shirt to touch the warm skin at her waist. She reached up to him, wanting to kiss him again, wanting to feel the prickle of his growing beard against her skin.

He slowly lowered himself, the expectant wanting stretching between them, growing even as the space between them shrank. She shifted her legs, letting one hook around him loosely, her foot on the back of his knee, her other foot on the floor as he came closer. His eyes devoured her, taking her in, digesting the soul-satisfying combination of her pale hair and vibrantly hued lips, the line of her cheekbones, the angle of her jaw, and the soft curve of her mouth.

She stopped breathing, her body’s automatic systems shutting down as every jot and tittle of her being yearned for his touch. She raised her head, bringing herself closer to him, and he brushed his lips feather-light against hers. Lightning crashed around them, brighter than the noon sun, and the echoing boom of a transformer blowing started a cacophony of barking dogs and car alarms that was overwhelmed by the sustained roll of thunder, an orchestral riot of tympanic vibration that shook the flat and plunged the room into darkness.

They both froze as the world flipped inside out and slowly rumbled back into place. She looked up him, her eyes wide as she waited to see what would happen next. Another bolt of lightning flared through the windows, causing their pupils to shrink and then flare again in the dark thundering rumble that followed.

“I think Thor is mad at you,” she giggled.

He grinned down at her. “What did I ever do to Thor?”

“He’s protecting the virtue of a Nordic maiden from the horrible tickling clutches of a…” her dramatic declaiming of his character faltered, “whatever it is you are,” she ended with a laugh.

“I don’t think being British quite qualifies as Nordic, honey.”

“I was born in Iceland. My mother was raised in Britain and went back to Iceland to take care of her grandmother and met my father. And then we came here to take care of my grandmother when I was a child.”

“That explains the ice princess coloring.”

“Have you ever even been to Iceland?” She rolled her eyes. “There’s not a lot of ice there.” She pushed lightly at his chest and he sat up. “Let me go get some candles.”

The mood had shattered like the air outside and he stood and helped her to her feet. She opened a small closet and started rummaging around inside. “And I’m a queen, not a princess, thank you very much.”

“My most humble apologies, your highness.”

“That’s right.” She nodded sharply.

“Or should I call you a khaleesi?”

“A what?” She turned around, her arms full of jelly jars with candles inside.

He took several of them from her. “You aren’t watching  _Game of Thrones_?”

“Apparently not, since I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“You should watch it. You have the perfect hair to dress up as Daenerys.”

“Is this a sex fantasy for you?” She tried to glare at him, but her impression of a fierce nun was more reminiscent of a leering gold miner.

“No,” he chuckled, “but it could be a good Halloween costume. Or if you ever go to a con.”

“Hmmm.” She set the candles down on the coffee table. “I hope you like cocoa.”

“Cocoa?” He wasn’t sure what she was getting at.

She turned to him. “When the lights go out, you make cocoa and play board games. It’s sort of the rules.” He could hear the laughing ‘duh’ in her voice.

“Well, far be it from me to break your rules.”

Halla handed him a box of matches and he lit the candles while she lit the gas stove and started the cocoa.

When he was done with the candles he came back into the kitchen and leaned against the counter, watching her whisk the cocoa into the milk in the saucepan. She seemed lost in her thoughts. She turned to him abruptly. “That’s who you should fight in your next movie,” she grinned at him, “Thor!”

He shook his head. “Superman can’t fight Thor.”

“What do you  _mean_  Superman can’t fight Thor?

“Well, partly because they’re both good guys, but mostly because Superman is DC and Thor is Marvel.

Her eyes narrowed and little lines of confusion showed up between her eyebrows. “Again with the you speaking words and me not understanding what you are saying.”

“They are from two different universes. It would be like Yoda showing up on the Enterprise.”

“Oh.” She was quiet for a minute as she stirred the milk. “That would be kind of cool though. Yoda would be all, ‘Do, or do not. There is no try.’ And Kirk would be, ‘I… am…trying.’” She did a horrible impression of William Shatner overacting. Henry laughed, his head thrown back.

He chimed in, “I’m a doctor, Jim, not a Jedi!”

She giggled. “Yoda would tell Spock to use the force, and he’d be all, ‘That is an interesting suggestion, but I feel it would be more logical to use the photon torpedoes.’”

“You set your phaser to stun. I’ll set my light saber to ‘chop off your hand.’” He had a very good Darth Vader impersonation.

“Yes, but who wins between a Jedi mind trick and a Vulcan mind meld?”

They spent the rest of the time the milk was heating discussing who would win in a contest between Spock and Obi-Wan Kenobi and whether or not Data and C-3PO would have been friends.

“I’m sort of surprised that a girly girl knows so much about Star Trek and Star Wars.”

She laughed. “That’s the benefit of having two older brothers who are both geeks. I grew up watching Star Trek. It’s why I fell in love with space.” She absentmindedly touched the star necklace at her throat. “I watch pretty much anything set in outer space,” she admitted, a faint sheen of pink coming to her cheeks.

“So, you’ve watched  _Battlestar Galactica._ ”

She nodded, her face breaking out into a grin. “Original and the reboot. The new one was amazing, though the ending kind of left me wondering, ‘what the what?’” She carefully poured the cocoa into the two waiting mugs.

“I know! The last hour I kept thinking, ‘I must be missing something.’”

She found the bag of miniature marshmallows in the cupboard. “Have you watched  _Babylon 5_?”

“No, but I’ve heard it’s fantastic.”

She held out the open bag to him. “I have it all on DVD. We could watch them sometime.”

“I think you’re asking me out on a second date.” He took a few and dropped them in his hot chocolate as he watched her reaction.

She didn’t look up at him, but he could see her smile in the candlelight. “There’s five seasons. I think it will take more than one date to get through them all.” She put a handful in her mug and a few in her mouth.

He slowly kissed her sugar-dusted lips and then whispered, “Good.”


	6. Chapter 6

Henry looked at the box Halla had placed on the coffee table and then back up at her in amusement. “Connect Four? Really?”

“Yeah,” she hugged her arms across her chest. “It’s either this, Scrabble, or Monopoly, which I believe should never be played with people that you want to still be friends with because inevitably someone is going to do a board flip and threaten to stick a hotel where it doesn’t belong.”

Henry snorted. “I’ve never known someone to actually finish a game of Monopoly.”

“I know it’s childish.” She was staring at her cup of cocoa. “My parents started the cocoa and games tradition when I was little because I got so scared during thunderstorms. It gave me something to enjoy rather than just freak out.” She picked one of the marshmallows out of her cocoa and put it in her mouth.

“Do you still get scared during thunderstorms?”

She pulled her thumb and finger from her mouth, making sure she had sucked all the chocolate off of them, and held them a small distance apart.

His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat as he looked at her fingers. “Right.” He set down his mug of cocoa. “Do you know what I’ve found works for taking your mind off of thunderstorms?” He walked towards her and Halla could feel an electric charge building in the room, even though there hadn’t been a lightning bolt for a few minutes.

Her eyelids felt heavy from watching him approach and her brain replayed for her the way his mouth had felt on her throat. “What?”

“A hug.”

She blinked. “A hug.”

“Yes.”

She bit her bottom lip and held her mug in both hands in front of her. “I don’t think me hugging you is a good idea.”

“Why not?”

“Because I hug you, and then I’ll remember how good you smell, and then I’ll want to take your shirt off, and then, you know, all sorts of bad decision making processes kick in.”

He took the mug from her and set it next to his. “Am I a bad decision?”

She couldn’t keep looking at his face. Those eyes could mesmerize her into anything, and their current playful blue could shift to a sexual siren song with astonishingly fast speed. She looked at his shirt, and that button she had played with before but stopped her hand in mid reach. Touching him would just lead to hugging him. She stepped back another step and put her hands in the rear pockets of her jeans. She stared at the floor and could only think of how his hand had felt on her stomach. “Anything we do after you take your shirt off will be, I’m almost positive, a bad decision.”

He stepped towards her again. “You took your shirt off. Was that a bad decision?”

She looked up at him in surprise. “That’s an entirely different situation.”

“How?”

“Well, I didn’t take off my shirt with the goal of getting you to touch me, but I’m almost positive if you take off your shirt, it would be with the object of getting me to touch you.”

His smile was more of a smirk. “Ah.”

“And you need to stop smiling like that.”

“Like what?” He raised an eyebrow in innocent dissembling.

“Where your cheeks get all cute and round and you think I’m adorable and you’re just waiting for me to give in and fling my pink sparkly knickers at you.”

“That’s a very specific smile.”

“You have a very expressive face.”

He watched her for several seconds, long enough for a blush to emerge from the neckline of her tee and spread up her throat. “Just out of curiosity, are your knickers pink and sparkly?”

There was a long pause. “Maybe.”

She watched him trying his best not to laugh, his shoulders shaking from repressed mirth.  His lips were firmly pressed together but even that did nothing to diminish their fullness; his dimples were practically laugh lines bracketing his mouth.

“Oh, go ahead and laugh.”

The sound erupted out of him, and he wrapped his arms around her. “I promise to keep my shirt on,” he murmured against her hair.

She rested her head over his heart, listening to the steady rhythm. She fit under his chin with just a little stretch on his part, and with one of his hands in the dip of her back and the other slowly stroking up and down her spine, she felt protected from more than just the weather outside.

“It wouldn’t be so bad,” she said, as she linked her arms around his waist, “if it wasn’t so loud. Weather shouldn’t be loud.”

“Why not?” He was learning that she had very strong opinions about the oddest things.

“Because weather should be the background. Sunshine is quiet, rain is a nice soothing quiet, but then you get to thunder and hurricanes and windstorms and tornadoes and avalanches and those are not quiet.”

He ran his fingers through her hair, the pale strands visible against his fingers even in the dark. “I don’t think an avalanche is actually weather.”

“Well, snow is quiet. Blizzards aren’t as quiet, and avalanches are sort of like extremely short lived concentrated blizzards.” This was very obvious to her, and she thought it was odd that it wasn’t also obvious to him.

“Well, when you put it like that.” He wanted to live in her head for twenty-four hours just to experience how she saw the world.

“I know, it makes total sense.”

His hand slid lower on her back, his pinky slipping under the waist of her jeans, though he kept the other fingers on top of the denim fabric. “What else isn’t allowed to be noisy?”

She shifted under his hand, curving her spine so her bum pushed out a bit. “Birds before 7:00am on weekdays and 9:00am at the weekend. Commercials on the telly. People talking on their mobiles in theatres and restaurants.”

He nodded, his chin slipping against her hair before he placed a soft kiss on the top of her head. “And what gets to be loud in your world?”

“Spectators at sporting events. Music that I like. Foghorns on ships when they are going down the Thames. Fire alarms. Me.”

His jaw ground to the side as he decided how to respond to that statement. “Are you loud often?”

“I didn’t mean it like that, you pervo.” She slapped his butt. “And I don’t think that’s a first date question anyway.”

“What number date question is it?”

“I would normally say five or six.”

He pulled back enough where he could see her face glowing in the candlelight. “Normally?”

She tilted her head back so she could see his eyes. “You make my brain wonky.” She felt like she was confessing to a priest.

A smiled played about his eyes. “And what does your wonky brain say?”

She had to swallow a few times before she could talk because she found that her mouth had gone unexpectedly dry. “That it’s good that I have a flat’s worth of junk piled on my bed right now.”

She could feel the warmth of his breath across her lips as he responded. “I think your brain has been talking to my brain.”

“It’s like one of those 50’s B movies. The Invasion of the Talking Brains.”

With a hum and a pop the lights came back on and Halla pulled back from Henry as the comforting darkness fled. “I guess you get out of playing Connect Four.”

He shook his head. “Oh, no. We are totally playing Connect Four.”

“Really?” Her eyes filled with excitement.

“Of course. I haven’t played this in forever, but I do remember a few tricks of the game.”

She batted her eyelashes at him. “Is making me choke on one of the pieces one of your tricks?”

“If you put it in your mouth, I can’t be held responsible for what happens to you.”

Henry worried that he might have gone too far when she sat down on the floor without responding. She opened the game box and looked up at him with a grin on her face. “Do you give that warning to all the girls you date?”

He took his seat on the other side of the table, stretching out his legs underneath it so his feet were near her hip. “Only the ones that I worry might choke.”

She dumped the pieces on the table. “As long as I’m not caught off guard I’m usually perfectly capable of swallowing.” Her matter-of-fact response caught Henry off-guard, and he stared at her for a few seconds before he began sorting the pieces into red and black piles.

“I’ll remember that.”

She smiled and scraped the red pieces towards her. “See that you do.”

Henry was a little surprised at Halla’s trash talking prowess, but quickly joined her in the increasingly comical attempts to throw shade over a game designed for four-year-olds. When they finally ended up tied at six victories each, Halla said, “Okay, this one is for all the glory.”

 He placed his elbows on the table and rested his chin on his interlaced fingers. “How about winner chooses where we go for our next date.”

“I thought we were going to watch  _Babylon 5._ ”

He grinned at her. “I think another evening with both of us cozied up on the couch together might not provide us with any incentive for restraint.”

She blushed and smiled back. “That’s probably true.”

“Of course if you win–”

“ _When_  I win–” she interjected.

“ _If_  you win, you can choose  _Babylon 5,_ and I won’t complain.” There was the flash of sexy blue in eyes that frequently appeared with the smile quirking half of his mouth.

“I would ask you what you would choose, but it doesn’t really matter since you won’t win.”

His laughter was loud, and Halla decided that it was a loud noise she enjoyed. “That’s a lot of sass from someone who has lost the last three games.”

“I didn’t want you to feel bad about yourself so I let you win a few.”

“You let me win.” His voice dripped with disbelief.

“That’s right.” She nodded. “I took a fall to protect Superman’s ego.”

“If that’s what you need to believe, Barbie.” He tossed her one of her pieces that had gotten mixed in with his.

The game was intensely fought, but Halla swore softly when Henry forced her into a position where no matter what she did, he would still win.

She sighed and fell back against the sofa. “I cede.”

“That was close.”

She flipped the lever and let the pieces crash noisily to the table. She scooped them up into her hands and dumped them in the box. “So, what are we going to do on our next date?”

“I’ll plan something.” He disassembled the playing board and put it back in the box. He caught her hand when she dumped in more of the playing pieces. “I’m really glad we shared that cab.”

“So am I.”

“Why do you sound sad all of a sudden?”

She smiled at him. “That the evening is over. I had a lot of fun. More fun than I’ve had in a long time.”

“Me too.” He interlaced his fingers with hers. “I’ll ring you tomorrow when I get everything planned. What’s your number?”

“Ummm, I threw away my mobile. I’ll go get one tomorrow and then I’ll call you with it?”

She went and found a pen and handed it to him with the envelope from her utility bill. He wrote his number down and handed it to her and she folded it and put in her pocket.

“Can I kiss you good night if I promise to keep my shirt on?”

She nodded, finding herself devoid of words, and he caught her chin in his hand and kept her face tilted up. His eyes had turned another shade of blue, one that she hadn’t seen so far this evening, and she found that this was the most fascinating shade yet. He kissed her, and his tongue touched her bottom lip and she stopped thinking about his eyes. His kiss goodnight swept through her with sparkling streamers, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, not wanting this perfect evening to end. If he would just keep kissing her, then she didn’t have to face anything else, and his warm, chocolate tinted kisses would guard her against all the worries scratching at the windows and trying to sneak under the door. He kept her safe, holding her against him with a large hand splayed against her back and his other hand grasped her rear. Halla moaned his name as he squeezed the full curve and he nipped at her mouth.

She pressed herself against him, wanting to feel his body against every inch of her, to emboss her skin with the lines of his shifting muscles. She pulled away from his kiss so she could brush her lips against his jaw, the rough stubble tickling at the over-sensitive skin. His soft moan was covered by her shudder from the touch and she kissed down his neck, slowly, tasting him with her tongue. Henry tasted of rainwater and smelt like the wind coming off an ocean in the middle of summer and her knees wobbled like jelly as he wrapped her hair around his hand and tugged her head back so he could kiss her the way she was kissing him. He raked his teeth against her earlobe and then sucked at the soft skin beneath her ear. Halla may describe herself as pink and girly and sparkly, but Henry would describe her as pink and delicate and soft. She gave way beneath his hands, letting him shape and mold her against his body. Even now, as he kissed his way down her neck, warm open kisses that let him taste her sugared sweetness, his hand on her back kept her firmly pressed against him. She clung to him in a way that he was unfamiliar with, not just holding him, but with an emotional intensity that turned her slipping her hand inside the collar of his shirt and across his back into an act of joining.

He kissed over the slender chain and onto her shoulder as he moved his hand from her back to her side, stroking up and down the s-curve of her waist to her hip and back up. He dipped his hand under her shirt, and let his fingers rest against the pale warmth of her skin as he nudged the fabric of her shirt aside, trailing kisses across her skin, nipping gently, being careful not to mark her. Not yet.

He loosened his hand in her hair and she took a handful of his and brought his mouth to hers for another kiss. Their mouths moved with a slow intensity, tasting, licking, sucking, biting; they had limited themselves to this for tonight, and they were going to suck every last bit of marrow out of their feast. She raked her nails across his back when he bit hard at her lip, and his moan shot through her, piercing her with a thousand invisible arrows. The heat pooling low in her stomach was reaching the boiling point, and she knew that if she didn’t stop him now, it wouldn’t just be his shirt that she would remove. Even the thought of him seeing her messy bedroom wasn’t a deterrent as both of his hands were under her shirt, spanning her ribcage with long fingers that she could easily imagine touching her in other places. Finally, she yelled at herself, _Halla, you’re on your damn period,_ and she reluctantly pulled away from his kiss.

Both of them were panting, cheeks flushed, lips swollen, staring at each other with barely restrained hunger.

“I should go now,” he said, as he removed his hands from under her shirt, trailing his fingers slowly against the warm flesh.

“Yeah, you probably should,” she replied, reluctantly removing her hand from the muscled expanse of his back.

“Right.” He ran his hand through his hair and then picked up his coat and cap. “I look forward to hearing from you tomorrow.”

“Until then.”

He opened the door to her flat and turned to look at her. She had not moved and was standing in the middle of the room watching him leave. He beckoned to her with a single finger and she walked to him, fighting the impulse to run across the room and jump into his arms like he was her long-lost love back from the war. He softly kissed her on the lips, one long lingering touch that was as intimate as anything she had ever experienced. “Goodnight, Halla.”

“Goodnight, Henry.”

She closed the door behind him and turned to face her empty flat, which felt five times larger and inextricably forlorn now that he was gone.

 


	7. Chapter 7

Halla tapped in the number from the folded envelope, and then wrote,  _Hey Superman, Barbie got a new mobile._

A minute later the generic buzz let her knew she had a new text.  **Is it pink**?

 _Yes_.

**Did you pay extra for it to be pink?**

_A little bit. And before you ask, no, it isn’t sparkly._

**What are you doing tonight?**

_I don’t know. This really cute boy asked me out but I’m not sure if he wants to do anything this evening._

**I think he does.**

_Do you think he knows what time this evening?_

**I think he wants to see you sooner than later.**

_Well, he may be in luck since I don’t have any plans after three this afternoon._

**Can I pick you up around four?**

_Sure. Do I need to dress up?_

**No. Jeans are fine.**

_Okay. See you around four._

Halla straightened the lace ruffle of her boot socks to make sure they were even and peeked out just the right amount above her knee-high boots. Part of her wasn’t sure why she was being so particular – he had seen her half-drowned and topless, so showing the exact right amount of knit lace was probably pointless, but the other part of her wanted to look perfect. She checked her reflection in the mirror one more time and took a deep breath. She’d already tried eight different tops, and the slouchy jumper she was wearing now matched the ruffle in her socks and had the added benefit that it could, if required, fall off one shoulder quite easily. The knock at the door settled it. This was what she was wearing.

She took one more deep breath and opened the door, looked at him for a long moment and then shut it again.

“Halla? Is everything okay?” Henry called through the door.

“No,” she answered with a strangled voice.

“What’s wrong?”

She rested her forehead against her door. “Your face is wrong.”

There was a pause of a few seconds before he answered. “What’s wrong with my face?”

“It’s too cute. I can’t deal with it.”

“What do you mean you can’t deal with it?”

“You’re wearing a blue shirt and it matches your eyes and I spent all day convincing myself that you weren’t really that cute but you  _are._ ”

There was a pause again and when he spoke, she could hear the laughter in his voice. “Halla, open the door.”

“I’m going to make an idiot of myself.”

“Halla,  _please_  open the door.”

“If I make an idiot out of myself or drool on you or something of the sort, it’s your own damn fault with your clean shaven jawline and your cheekbones and your eye-matching shirt like you have no care for the emotional well-being of the women who look at you.”

“I understand. Would you like me to sign a waiver of some sort?”

She opened the door an inch and peered at him through the crack. “No, that won’t be necessary.” She let the door swing open the rest of the way. “You look very nice.”

His quirky half-smile made her blush. “You look beautiful. I ought to make  _you_  sign a waiver.”

She swung the door shut behind her, brushing against him as she turned to lock it. When she turned back around, he asked, “Would it be appropriate for me to kiss you now?”

“I guess. Though you have to catch me if I fall down the stairs.”

He slid his hand into her hair, cradling the back of her head, and kissed her softly. She lifted on her toes to make it easier to return the gesture, resting a hand on his chest to keep her balance. The simple kiss intensified as their tongues gently touched and Henry drew his head back. “We should go. I’ve got a cab waiting.”

Halla nodded and linked her fingers through his. When Henry gave the destination to the cabbie, Halla tried not to look surprised. “The British Museum?”

“Is that okay?”

She nodded hurriedly. “Just unexpected.”

“It’s one of my favorite places in London.”

“Really? What do you love about it so much?” She turned on the seat so she could see him easier.

He rested his hand on her knee, his fingers wrapping around her leg. “The Egypt rooms. I never outgrew the fascination with mummies and curses and pyramids.”

She smiled at his obvious enthusiasm. “Studying Egypt always makes me feel so tiny and insignificant. They lived thousands of years ago and we’re still studying them, we know who they were, their memory persists. I don’t think I’m going to make a mark on history the way they did.”

“Well, most of them didn’t either. We remember the rulers, some of the other elites, but most of the people are nameless and forgotten.”

“Well this is a depressing start to a date.” She couldn’t help but giggle. “We shall all die and be forgotten. Very Ozymandius.”

“Nice reference.”

She started drawing patterns on the back of his hand, tracing the veins that she could feel under his skin. “A little bit of school stuck around in the brain, whether I wanted it to or not.”

“Did you go to university?”

“I read physics and astronomy at Manchester.”

His eyebrows rose. “Really?”

“Is that hard to believe?”

He frowned. “No. I’m just intimidated now. Why aren’t you looking through a microscope for a living?”

“You mean a telescope? I did for a while. It didn’t work out. It turns out the lab life isn’t for me. They want all the sparkle to be in the stars, not on my toes.”

Henry watched as she stared out the window, her flippant response an obvious deflection. He wouldn’t push now, though. Someday she would tell him what happened. He put his arm around her shoulder and held her silently until they arrived at the museum. Henry was most excited about the new display of funerary sculpture that had just been put on display, but they spent hours wandering through the rooms of the museum, impersonating sculptures, making up back stories about the people in the paintings, deciding what pieces it would be the easiest and most cost-effective to steal if they were on a Mission Impossible style jewel heist, and getting the stink eye from museum guards as they played ‘how close can we get to that priceless artifact before we get yelled at.’ They made it to closing time without being forcibly removed from the premises and walked down the museum steps into the neverdark of an urban night.

Henry hailed a taxi and as they settled into the back seat, he drew Halla into his side. “I’m now going to take you to a little backstreet pub where they serve one of my guilty pleasures.”

Her face was a perfect picture of concern. “Do I even want to know?”

“I’ll let it be a surprise.”

She let herself look at him for a few moments, trying to reconcile that rugged good looks with the intelligent man she had spent the last several hours touring a museum with. She had been consistently impressed by his knowledge amidst all the games they were playing. “I have to admit, you are not what I was expecting.”

“And what were you expecting, Miss Sparkley Astrophysicist?”

She wrinkled her nose at him and he bent in to kiss her. “You are so adorable,” he murmured against her mouth. “I bet if we sent your picture out into space, the aliens would be willing to talk to us.”

She rested her head on his shoulder. “I don’t know. I think species intelligent enough to have developed interstellar travel are smart enough to leave us alone until we get past the point where our initial impulse when confronted with something different is to kill it.”

He looked down at her, but could only see the top of her head. “Do you think we’re that barbaric?”

“We have obesity problems in one country living cheek by jowl – literally – with childhood malnutrition. I imagine we look like a disease rather than a civilization to space-faring races.”

He kissed her softly on her head, surprised by her sudden melancholy. “Do you believe in aliens?”

“Based on pure mathematics and probability? Yes. Do I think they’ve been here slaughtering our cattle or buttsexing our farmers? No.”

His laughter echoed in the cab. “I never know what’s going to come out of your mouth.”

She bit her bottom lip as she blushed. “Yeah. It’s sort of a problem I have.”

“I don’t think it’s a problem.”

“Let me guess, you think it’s adorable.” She wrinkled her nose at him again.

“And if I do?”

She shrugged, her jumper slipping slightly off her shoulder. “There’s worse things to be called than adorable.”

His fingers played across the newly exposed skin. “Do you not like it? I’ll stop.”

“Please don’t.” She gazed up at him. His eyes were dark in the flickering lights scattering over them from outside. “It sounds nice on your lips.”

“You sound nice on my lips.” He closed the small distance between them, kissing her softly, and she lifted her hand to his head, irresistibly attracted to his curls. He had smoothed his hair down for their date, but once she touched it, she couldn’t help herself and ruffled her fingers through it. “Hey, it takes a lot of effort to get my hair to behave,” he chided her with laughter-riddled words.

She giggled. “You shouldn’t bother. I love your curls. They make me twitchy.”

“Twitchy?” That eyebrow arched at her again.

“Yes. I want to touch them and I have to keep myself from twisting them around my finger and making sproingy noises when I pull them and let them go.”

His chuckle was soft and meant just for her. “You’re a five year old girl at heart, aren’t you?”

“That’s okay, because I’m pretty sure you’re a six year old boy.”

His mouth quirked in that smile that had found a favored place in her heart already. “It’s true mostly, but I’m pretty sure I’m better at kissing now than I was when I was six.”

“Well, not having kissed you when you were six, I lack the necessary data to make a conclusive ruling on that, but I’m going to go ahead and say probably, yes, you are.”

Again with the eyebrow. “Only probably?”

“Well, my sample size is really small still.”

“Then let me help fix that.”

Their lips awkwardly bumped as they both leaned in at the same time, and she giggled before he caught her face in his hands and then she sighed softly as the warmth of his mouth spilled through her. She melted into him as their mouths moved together. Every kiss with him had felt different, and this tender yet knowledgeable demonstration of his skill not only of kissing in general, but kissing her in specific – he knew exactly how much pressure to exert to get her to part her lips, where to lick to get her to whimper, how hard to bite to make her breath catch in her throat – was like none she had experienced before. It didn’t seem possible that he could know her that well this quickly but then he moved his hand to her back and pulled her closer and the passage of time became irrelevant as she pressed herself against his chest.

The cabbie coughed loudly when they arrived at their destination, a nondescript pub down a back street somewhere near the London Bridge. The sign read The Miller and Henry led her past the outside tables overflowing with laughing patrons enjoying their meals under the warmth of space heaters. The inside was noisy and crowded but Henry obviously was known enough that a waitress led them past the mismatched tables and chairs to a small two-top in the back corner where she whisked away the reserved sign sitting on it and left them two paper menus.

“Okay, you have to get a hot dog.”’

“A hot dog? Really?”

“Yes. They do the best hot dogs here; they’re more like sausages than American hot dogs. And they have an amazing bar as well.”

A knot formed in Halla’s stomach as she read over the menu. Live music poured down the stairs as she decided on something called a Springer Spaniel and Henry ordered a Bull Mastiff. The waitress asked for their drink orders and Henry ordered a Flying Dog Raging Bitch with a laugh, and Halla ordered a cherry Coke.

The waitress left as Henry looked at her in surprise. “This bar set-up and you’re going for a cherry Coke?”

“Have you ever had a cherry Coke made with grenadine? And besides, I like tying the cherry stem in a knot with my tongue.”

His jaw dropped a bit. “Can you really do that?”

“You’ll see.”

Their drinks arrived before their food and Henry looked at her expectantly.

Halla laughed and picked up the cherry from her drink. Holding it by the very end of the stem, she lowered it into her mouth and pulled off the fruit with a very slight pop as it separated from the stem. She chewed and swallowed the sweet fruit and then put the stem into her mouth. She caught the end of it between her teeth to hold it in place, and then watched him watch her as she twisted the stem. After several seconds she stuck her tongue out, the stem tied in a perfect knot sitting on it. She held it up. “Just takes practice.”

Henry shuddered and Halla laughed as she picked up her drink and took a long swallow. “Seriously, I ought to just buy a bottle of grenadine to keep at home.” She held out the glass. “Do you want to try?”

He took a small sip. “That tastes like dessert.”

“I know. It’s so good.” She smiled blissfully as she took another drink.

“Do you want to try mine?” He held out the bottle and she got a strong whiff of citrus hops and coriander.

“No, I don’t think I’m man enough to drink a Raging Bitch.”

“Are you sure?”

She grinned at him. “Yeah, I think I’ll sit over here with my girly drink.”

The waitress came back with their food and Halla was presented with a sausage in a toasted roll piled high with pickled mushrooms and red cabbage and other things she didn’t recognize and couldn’t remember from the description on the menu. Henry’s was loaded with chorizo and pickled onions and sour cream. She picked up the monstrosity trying to figure out how to eat it. She managed to take a bite and put a hand to her mouth as she sucked in the fugitive strings of cabbage. Henry fared a bit better with his, but was also reduced to licking his lips.

Halla laughed once she finally cleared her mouth. “Between the mess factor and the onions I wouldn’t have pegged this as a standard date choice but oh god, this is good.”

“You want to try a bit of mine?” He held it out to her and she leaned across the table to take a bite. She shoved hers across the table to him as she chewed and grabbed for her glass.

“That’s got a bit of a kick to it.”

He took a bite of hers and slid her plate back towards her. “You don’t like spicy foods?”

“It’s good. I just wasn’t expecting it.”

She drained her drink, trying to get her mouth to cool down. Henry beckoned for the waitress, “Can you bring her another cherry Coke? And a bowl of cherries with the stems on?”

Halla turned as red as a maraschino. “I hope those are for you to practice on.”

“You’ll have to show me how to do it. Several times. I’m a slow learner.”

“You’re a liar.”

He grinned at her. “My pants aren’t on fire.”

“Yeah, you have a stunt double for that, right?” she teased him.

He leaned forward, his brow lowering. “I do as many of my own stunts as the insurance allows.”

She sat back at his stern look. “Sorry. It was supposed to be a joke.”

“I know.” He relaxed into his chair again. “I get asked a lot about how much of what I do is actually me and how much is CGI. I guess it’s a sensitive spot.”

“Do you have any others I should know about?”

“Not that I can think of.”

They finished their food as they talked, feeding each other chips and Halla laughing hysterically as Henry contorted his face trying to tie a cherry stem into a knot. “You have to use the tip of your tongue.”

He gave up and spit out the stem. “I haven’t heard that in years.”

Halla threw a chip at him. “Boo, you whore.”

He choked on his drink. “Did you just call me a whore?”

“Have you never seen  _Mean Girls_?”

He shook his head as he pounded his chest with the side of his fist. “No. I’m assuming that’s a line from it?”

She looked at him as if he were part of the great unwashed masses. “Yes. Okay, we’re going to have a movie night and you’re going to watch  _Mean Girls_ and  _Legally Blonde_ and _Pitch Perfect._ ”

“All in one evening?”

She thought for a second as she added the times in her head. “Well, maybe two. But you really need to watch them so you understand what I say to you.”

He pointed at her with his beer bottle. “This is your version of me teaching you to play  _World of Warcraft_ , isn’t it?”

“Oh, I forgot to tell you.” She bounced in her chair. “I’m level twelve now!”

“You are?”

“I messed around on it after you left last night and I started just running around and there’s this big huge city and it has a train in it and I got on the train and it took me to another city and it’s much prettier there, so I tried figuring out what to do and I actually completed quests without dying. It’s sort of fun. I can make bandages! And mine copper and stuff! I think I’m going to become a jeweler.”

Henry nodded, impressed that she had stuck with it. “That’s excellent. I’ll send you some stuff next time I’m in game to get you going.”

She started asking questions about the game as they finished their chips and he talked her into tying one more stem into a knot.

“Let’s get you another drink and go upstairs and listen to the music. We can dance a little.”

“I’m fine.”

“Really? They have perry here if you want something fruity.”

“No, actually,” she took a deep breath, “I kind of need to get out of here.”

“Are you alright?”

“Yes. I just need some fresh air.”

He looked at her in concern and could tell she was going pale even under her normally light-colored skin. “Okay, let me settle our bill.”

She finished her drink while he paid. He took a final swallow of his second Raging Bitch and escorted her out. “Are you sure you’re alright?” he asked again as she took a few deep breaths once they were out of the pub. He grabbed the taxi that was dropping people off and helped her inside.

She smiled, her eyes artificially bright, and nodded. “I just got a little claustrophobic for a minute.”

He bent to kiss her and she jerked her head back. He straightened slowly. “What’s going on, Halla?”

“I can smell the beer on you,” she whispered.

“Is that a problem?”

“It is for me.” She fiddled with the zipper pull on her purse.

“Are you Muslim or something?”

“No, I’m an alcoholic.”

He laughed and then stopped as he realized she wasn’t kidding. “You’re an alcoholic,” he repeated slowly.

“Yes. I’ve been sober for ten months and that’s the first time I’ve been in a pub since I stopped drinking and it took all the willpower I had not to rip that damn bottle out of your hand and drain it.” She sighed, her head falling back against the fake leather of the seat. “I’d forgotten how good hops smell,” she murmured.

“And me smelling like beer is making it worse?”

“I don’t know what I’ll do if you kiss me and I can taste it on you.” She spoke to the ceiling, not wanting to see the look on his face, or to have him see the look on hers as she her hopes crumbled.

He scooted across the seat from her, giving her some more room. “So you don’t drink at all.”

“I can’t. I’m not someone who can have one or two and stop. If the bottle’s not empty, I’m not done.”

“So you don’t go to pubs or out dancing or things like that.”

She shook her head. “I can’t.”

“Sporting events? Where other people are drinking?”

“Nope.”

“So what  _do_ you do?”

“Not wake up in a pool of my own vomit.” She stared out the window at the lights sliding past, illuminating faceless strangers on their pursuit of pleasure.

“It was that bad?”

“I have more than a thousand pounds of credit card debt for every year I’ve been alive. The only reason I’m not in jail right now is because Mummy and Daddy pulled strings, but they won’t do that again. I lost my fellowship because I kept showing up to the observatory late, drunk, or hung over, or drunk and hung over, and I screwed up some important data, and I begged my supervisor for another chance, and I told him I would do  _anything_ , and that may work in pornos, but in real life it gets you slapped with a restraining order and a reputation that means no other lab will hire you.”

Henry didn’t know what to say and so said nothing. The cab pulled up in front of Halla’s flat, and she looked at him. He didn’t move. “I don’t want to get too close to you. I don’t want to mess you up any more than I already did.”

Her shoulders sank but she made herself smile. “Thanks for a wonderful evening.”

He nodded. “I had a great time.”

When she got back in her flat she turned on the computer and did what she had kept herself from doing since he had left the night before; she Googled him. In just a few minutes she found herself looking at strings of candid photos of him drinking and clubbing, including a stream of twitter photos of him with fans over the course of an evening in Jersey which she could put in chronological order by how much chest he was showing, and a painful quote from an interview where he said that he liked women who “made good drinking buddies – and I can drink a lot.”

She turned off the computer, turned off the lights and crawled into bed, wishing that it was that simple to turn off her heart.


	8. Chapter 8

Halla smoothed down her shirt nervously before she opened the door to the office building. She checked the sign in the lobby for the offices of Jenny Carter and then headed to the lift.  _Deep breath,_  she reminded herself as she rode to the seventh floor. She hadn’t heard from Henry since Friday night, but Saturday morning she had gotten a call from Ms. Carter saying that she had heard that Halla was interested in learning more about being a stylist and she didn’t normally do this but one of her assistants had quit with no warning and would she mind coming in Monday morning for a trial period? She was scheduled to meet with Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy and didn’t want to be shorthanded. Halla had managed not to squeal on the phone, and googling Fassbender and McAvoy had taken over from googling Henry for the rest of the weekend.

She opened the door to the offices and stopped short as she almost bumped into a walking pile of clothes. From behind the stack of garments a voice said, “Are you Halla?”

“Yes?”

“Good, take these.”

Halla grabbed the stack of clothes that was thrust at her and the young woman who emerged from behind the pile said, “I’ll be right back.” A minute later she came back with another, slightly smaller stack of clothes. “Follow me.”

Halla did what she was told. “I’m Chelsea by the way. I’m the senior assistant. You’re the junior assistant. That means you do what I tell you. If you have questions, ask me, not Jenny. You do not disturb her  _ever_  when she’s in her office. Only I can disturb her, is that clear?”

“Yes.” The knot in Halla’s stomach was growing, and she could feel her coffee starting to churn.

“Good, now we need to get those clothes hung, by outfit, in the next twenty minutes so start hanging.”

Chelsea shoved a clothes rack her way and Halla started carefully hanging each article of clothing, making sure it was straight and all the hangers faced the same way. “Who are these for?”

“You’ve got Fassbender’s and I’m hanging McAvoy. They’ll be here in twenty minutes.”

Halla looked skeptically at the pair of orange trousers she was putting on a hanger. “What are they being styled for?”

“Apparently Marvel has decided they want a stylist to oversee the apparel for the press cycle for the new X-Men movie coming out. Too many weird and sloppy outfits last time, and Jenny got the contract to coordinate the whole thing.”

“For just these two or for all of them?” she asked as she hung a white button down shirt. The cotton was so smooth it felt like silk.

“All of them.”

Halla tried to imagine what it would be like to tell Sir Patrick Stewart and Sir Ian McKellen what to wear and didn’t think she would ever have that courage.

“These are the first two we’re doing though. Since they are the major stars, we’re going to build around them.”

“This must be a huge opportunity.”

“It is, so don’t screw it up.”

Halla smoothed out the crease in a pair of black trousers. Her mind raced with all the potential ways she could make an idiot out of herself and ruin this opportunity that had fallen into her lap.

Chelsea finished her clothes and came over to her with a notepad in her hand. “Okay, let’s make sure you’ve got these in the right combinations.” She started naming off items of clothes, and once the hangers were all together, she put a numbered tag around them. She then said, “See those boxes on the table?”

Halla nodded.

“Grab the one that says F1 on it and then it needs these items in it.” She listed off a specific belt, shoes and a watch. Halla scanned the table looking for the right items and placed them in the box. “Now put the box on the top rack shelf and make sure the F1 label is facing forward.”

Once she did that, Chelsea handed her the notepad. “Now do the rest of your boxes.”

Working as fast as she could, and mentally cursing her unfamiliarity with men’s fashion labels, she managed to get almost all of the boxes done before Chelsea finished hers and came over to help her put the last two boxes together. They had just gotten them shelved when a bell sounded.

“That means they’re here.”

Chelsea hurried her out to the lobby and greeted them. “Hi, I’m Chelsea. This is Halla, she’s new so don’t mind her if she doesn’t know what she’s doing yet. She’s got thirty minutes of experience. Can I get either of you something to eat or drink?”

They both asked for water and she smiled. “I’ll get that for you. Jenny will be right out.” She waved her hand at the opulently appointed waiting area. It looked more like the lounge of a high-end hotel than anything Halla had ever seen in an office before.

Chelsea beckoned for Halla to come with her and she followed Chelsea down the hall to a small but well-stocked kitchen. Chelsea took to glass bottles of Perrier from the fridge and pointed to a list on the fridge door. “Always check off what you take out. It will be your job to go to the market when things get low, and you do not want to see Jenny’s face if we run out of something.”

Halla followed her back out, apparently she wasn’t allowed to carry water by herself yet, and met Jenny; saw Jenny was a better description, for the beautiful and voluptuous brunette didn’t acknowledge her at all. Everyone trailed after her into the consulting room.

“Shall we get started? We want to do outfit approval and make sure we get any necessary changes done now so you’ll be ready far in advance of when the press tours start. I see my assistants,” and she shot them a glare that would pierce armor, “don’t have your clothing in the dressing rooms yet so I’ll have them take those in and James you can follow Chelsea and Michael you can follow Halla.”

Once again she found herself following Chelsea who led her to the dressing rooms. “Put the cart in the room against the wall by the door and make sure the labels on the boxes are facing out,” she hissed.

Halla struggled to hold the door open and pull the clothing rack through at the same time and Michael grabbed the door and held it for her. “Thank you,” she whispered and pulled the rack through. She pushed it up against the wall, realized it was facing the wrong way and flipped it around and shoved it back into place. “I’m so sorry.”

Michael smiled at her, and Halla couldn’t help but notice how different his smile was from Henry’s. They both had the same big wide smiles, but Michael’s showed so many more teeth that it would have seemed shark-like if he hadn’t also seemed so friendly. “First days always suck.”

Halla nodded. “Thank you for understanding. And I apologize in advance for the orange trousers,” she stage whispered.

Michael looked at the clothes rack and nodded. “I’ll remember that.”

She left him to change, assuming she wasn’t supposed to stick around for that part, and made her way back out to where Jenny and Chelsea were chatting. Chelsea handed her a notepad and a pen. “Write down every modification Jenny makes to the outfit. If she swaps something out, cuffs a sleeve, undoes a button,  _anything._ You’ll be typing up cards to go with each outfit so they know exactly how to dress themselves without Jenny there to tell them.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Chelsea pointed at a small chair and table. “You sit there. You take notes for Mr. Fassbender, and I’ll do Mr. McAvoy.”

The first outfits they came out in were tuxedos, and there wasn’t much to change there, though Jenny did make comments about needing to fix the break in both of their trousers. Chelsea carefully noted down these comments.

The next outfits out include Michael in the horrendous bright orange trousers. They were slim cut and cuffed and showed his bare ankles over a pair of oxblood saddle shoes. Halla made a gagging face, knowing that Jenny couldn’t see her. Unfortunately Michael did.

“Something wrong, Halla?” he asked.

Jenny whirled around and glared at her.

“No, sir.”

He smirked at her. “You made the most awful face. I assumed it must be in reaction to what we were wearing.”

“Is there something you wished to share, Halla?” Jenny asked, her voice tight as jeans fresh from the dryer.

She swallowed nervously. “I just am not convinced that those particular trousers are the best option for Mr. Fassbender.”

Chelsea sank in her seat, covering her eyes with one hand.

“And why not?” She spit the word like a sniper shoots a bullet.

As Chelsea tried to make herself invisible, Halla’s heart raced with anger. That bastard had got her in trouble on her first day here; she would be gone before the day was over. Taking advantage of the opportunity to be honest and wanting to get back at Michael, she said, “It kind of makes him look like a hipster fuckweed wannabe.”

James laugh echoed in the room before he clamped his hand over his mouth. Michael looked like he was trying not to laugh as well, which riled Halla even more.

“Did you just call Mr. Fassbender a ‘fuckweed’?” The air around her practically crackled with balefire.

“No, I said the outfit you’re putting him in makes him  _look_  like a fuckweed.”

“And you, with your thirty minutes of experience in this industry, think you could dress him better than I?”

“Actually yeah, I do.”

Jenny gestured grandly. “Be my guest.”

“Do you have any other clothes around here?”

“Chelsea, show Halla to the closets. You have five minutes.”

Chelsea followed her out of the room and looked at her with wide eyes. “You’re dead, you know that, right?”

Halla nodded as she ran down the halls with Chelsea.

“And you’ll never work as a stylist in London?”

“Yep.”

“Good luck. Take the bitch down a notch on your way out.”

Chelsea threw open a set of double doors. “Men’s clothing down the right.”

Halla ran down the aisle. “What’s his size, do you remember?”

Luckily she did, and helped her find the right section. “For James, will you pull me a couple different waistcoats, cardigans, some solid neckties and some patterned shirts. Khaki trousers, maybe a pair of cargos, and some jeans. Also, motorcycle boots if we have them.”

“You’re going to redress James as well?” Chelsea started pawing through the racks.

“Go big or go home, right? Well, in my case, I’ll do both.” She was pulling the items she wanted as fast as she could.

The two of them raced back to the consulting room with their armfuls of clothes.

“Right,” Halla said, catching her breath. “Even if they didn’t make you look horrible, the color is going to clash with either of your hair if you’re going to be in your natural ginger. It’s just too bright of a color to play well. Maybe if it had been a pumpkin it would work, but no. So, you’re going to want to take those off.” She tossed him a pair of dark jeans that showed a hint of wear. “Put those on instead.” He starting stripping out of the trousers and she very carefully didn’t watch.

“Your photo shoots tend to go one of two ways – you’re either falling out of a suit or all sweaty in a tee, so let’s do something different.” She handed him a dark green rugby jersey with a mustard colored triple stripe across the chest. “Classic, but athletic. It plays off your role as the muscle in the duo, and I’ve pulled ‘hot professor’ clothes for James. Patterned shirts, solid ties, waistcoats and cardigans with a bit of texture to them. It will make people want to pet him. Maybe get him some glasses.”

She turned back to Michael, who was buttoning the jeans. “I couldn’t find the shoes I wanted in your size, but I’m thinking a nice distressed leather ankle boot.”

He pulled the rugby shirt over his head, and it skimmed over him, a narrower fit and lighter fabric than a regulation shirt. She shoved the sleeves up a bit. “Now, see you look like you’re on a weekend vacation, but you don’t look like a tool.”

“You look good,” James said.

Michael nodded. “I like it better than the orange trousers.”

“I thought it would keep the macho ‘I’ll punch you in the face if you look at me wrong’ vibe that you seem to cultivate in so many of your photo shoots, but in a completely different way.”

She leaned back against the table holding the clothes. “I’ve got some knits here for you, some plain v-necks in nice fabrics so people will want to pet you too, but they’ll also show off your build, make it obvious you have pectorals. There are a couple raglan color-blocked jumpers in here that are reminiscent of baseball jerseys. Wear the one you like the best in American markets. Don’t wear them both. And one plain white tee-shirt, which you can only wear with this jacket.” She pulled a pile of black fabric and silver snaps and zippers out of the stack. “It’s pretty much the bastard off-spring of a hoodie and a biker jacket, but when you have the days where you’re spending nine hours in a chair telling the same stories over and over again, it will at least make you look like you’re putting in some effort while not being uncomfortable to wear.”

She sighed and shoved her hair out of her face and looked at Jenny.

“Well, that’s very amusing, but I don’t think I’m going to require your input anymore today.”

Halla nodded. “Thank you for the opportunity.”

She turned and went to the small table to get her purse and then headed for the door. As she opened it, she turned back. “Oh, and James, wear those biker boots I picked out with the pea coat she picked rather than the loafers.”

“Thank you,” he called, the Scottish brogue making it sound like yew. Michael was watching her with a bemused smile and she saluted him before she shut the door behind her. She managed to get to the lift before she gave in to tears. One more opportunity gone. She tried to give herself a pep talk.  _At least this means you won’t be indebted to Henry for your job._  All it did was remind her that he hadn’t called, and that chance was gone as well.

She was walking towards the tube station, no money for a taxi anymore, when her mobile rang. She didn’t recognize the number but she answered it. Having lost her contacts in her old phone, she didn’t recognize any numbers lately.

“Hello?”

“Hello. Is this Halla?”

“Yes.” She didn’t recognize the voice.

“This is James. James McAvoy. I was wondering if maybe you fancied getting a cup of coffee?”

She stopped in her tracks, causing the person behind her to bump into her. “How did you get my number?”

“Well, Michael can be very persuasive when he wants to and he got it from Jenny.”

“Why?”

“Well,” he dragged out the word again and she could hear his accent, “he feels terrible about getting you fired on your first day and was wondering if he could make it up to you.”

She sighed and rubbed her forehead. “I don’t think a cup of coffee is going to pay my rent.”

“We have a proposition for you.”

She didn’t answer for so long that James checked if she was still there. “Yes, I’m here, but I’m not that desperate. I mean, I’m sure a lot of girls would jump at the chance to do you, but-”

“No, not  _that_ kind of a proposition. A job.”

The magic words. “You want to offer me a job? What kind of job?”

“Come have coffee with us and we’ll chat.” He named a café she knew that wasn’t too far away. “We’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”

“Don’t you still have to get fitted for the rest of your outfits?”

He laughed. “Not anymore.”

Before she could ask what he meant, he hung up.

Fifteen minutes later, the two men walked into the café and joined her in a booth.

“Have you ordered yet?” James asked.

“No, I figured I would wait for Michael so he could pay.”

Michael laughed. “Well, let’s order then.”

Halla’s order for Eggs Benedict, a blueberry muffin and ‘an Americano as big as my head’ was met with an amused smile by both men. She sat back down and looked at them. “So, what’s up, buttercups?”

“First off, I’m sorry about losing you your job. I didn’t realize Jenny doesn’t have a sense of humor.”

Halla watched him blank faced. “You must be really bad at observing people, then.”

James snorted as he studiously avoided looking at either one of them.

“You have never been a stylist before?” Michael asked.

“Nope. And it looks like I won’t be one again, either.”

He leaned forward, crossing his arms on the table as he talked. “Where did you learn all that stuff?”

“About shirts and boots and things?”

He nodded.

“I spent the weekend on the internet. It’s amazing what you can learn on there.”

“So you taught yourself how to dress celebrities for different events.”

She took a sip of her coffee. “Well, yes. It’s not difficult.”

“But specifically us. You were using the clothes to invoke our characters.”

She shrugged. She couldn’t see why this was such a big deal. “It seemed like the right thing to do. You’ll be doing a lot of press together, it seemed like a way to differentiate you from each other rather than two guys in grey t-shirts and jeans.”

Michael and James looked at each other.

“Right,” James said. “Here’s the deal. We want to hire you.”

“For what?”

“Personal assistant.” He looked at her, brows rising in expectation, nodding his head as if to say, “Pretty exciting, right?”

“To both of you? How will that work?”

“Well, for Michael mostly, my wife is good at kicking my arse when I need it, but I’d like to throw in some tasks every once in a while. And then when we start travelling for press, you come along and keep us dressed and on schedule and showing up at the right places and things like that.”

She let that sink in for a minute. “You want me to babysit you two while you travel the world together in front of an international press circus.”

“Yes.”

She closed her eyes. Better get this out of the way now before they found out later and abandoned her in Tokyo. “There’s something you should probably know about me.”

“What’s that?” Michael asked.

“I’m an alcoholic.”

Neither one of them seem concerned. “How long have you been sober?” James asked.

“Ten months.”

“Do you want a drink now?” he continued.

“I’m an alcoholic. I pretty much always want a drink. But I haven’t made an effort to get one in over seven months.”

Michael and James looked at each other and shrugged. Michael said, “Well, then remember that Guinness is not actually a breakfast food, and we should be fine.”

“Alrighty, then.” She was flummoxed at their easy acceptance of her addiction. “I accept your job offer.”

“Welcome to Team Fassavoy,” Michael said.

“It’s Team McBender,” James corrected him.

Halla laughed. “I don’t care what you call it; I’m not putting it on my shirt.”

 


	9. Chapter 9

Halla sat on her bed,  _Florence and the Machine_  on her iPod, reading through the papers that Michael’s agent had messengered over to her. She had never seen so much legalese before, and she carefully went through each line of the contract she was expected to sign. Her sight lingered on the salary amount, a number large enough for her to start making a dent in her debt and put a little bit away towards savings. She’d still be living in this tiny flat for several years, but the way out and up was finally visible.

She picked up her phone from where it lay on her bed and checked to see if she had missed any messages. She hadn’t, and she knew she hadn’t because she had been there the whole time, but part of her still hoped for a miracle. “Shake it Out” came on the speakers and as she sang along, horribly off-key, she decided she was done waiting for him to call her.

_I know it was only two dates, and maybe I’m projecting, but if you ever decide that I’m more important than alcohol, feel free to look me up._

A few minutes later, she got a text back.  **I’m not an alcoholic, Halla.**

_We had a connection. You can deny it if you want, but we did, and you chose the ability to get drunk when you want over me. I’m not blaming you. This life isn’t fun. But if you ever change your priorities, I’m here._

She went back to reading through the papers as she waited for him to respond. He never did. Before she went to sleep that night, she tossed Charles in the bin.

***

Halla loved working for Fassy. She had called him Mr. Fassbender the first day and he had ordered her never to do that again. He had told her to call him Michael, and she had for the first few days until he pitched a fit about having to eat chicken for lunch again and she yelled, “Eat your damn chicken, Fassy, and stop whinging,” from the kitchen.

He had yelled back, “Who gave you permission to be so sassy with me?”

Her bellowed reply of “You knew what you were getting when you hired me, you fuckweed,” had earned howling laughter.

“Okay, Fassy and Sassy. We make a good team.”

“Yes, now eat your damn chicken.”

It had been quickly obvious why James wanted a personal assistant for Michael. He was building muscle for a new role which meant he was on a high calorie, high protein diet, so she was basically throwing poultry at his head every time he walked by, and she could sympathize with the boring consistency of his diet. It was the body-builder’s version of living off of ramen noodles. She spent the afternoon researching marinades, and the next day she spent the morning in his kitchen making marinades and individually bagging servings of chicken in different marinades and throwing them in his freezer so at least he could have flavor with his food.

It was a bit like being a nanny. She kept track of his schedule and made sure he was at all of his meetings on time. She particularly enjoyed when he was meeting with his production company. Halla would sit quietly in the corner and listen to all the intricacies of the movie making business, and the stories about actors and crew. The reason for the non-disclosure agreement she had signed became increasingly clear.

Her first week with him, she had arrived at his flat to find workmen in the downstairs lounge. When she had asked him what they were doing, he said, “Building a bar. I’ve always wanted to have a bar in there, and you were my incentive to finally call someone about it. This way all the alcohol is out of the kitchen and you won’t have to see it when you’re in there.”

She had assured him that it wasn’t necessary, but he had insisted. “I’m going to have a swinging bachelor pad, man.”

“I think you’ve been living in the seventies too long.” She teased him about it, asking if he was going to install a roller-disco rink in the dining room, but it had touched her that he was that considerate of her.

Her favorite times were when she was working with both James and Fassy together. She spent one afternoon listening to them record post-production dialog for  _Days of Future Past_. The two fed off of each other’s energy, and watching the two of them crack each other up between takes gave her the giggles.

Halla let herself into the flat on a Wednesday morning and headed up the stairs to his bedroom. “Rise and shine, cupcake!” She opened the floor to ceiling drapes that kept the room pitch black so the sunlight fell in long panels of light across his bed. “I will steal your blankets if you don’t get out of bed.” She waited for some sort of response as she stood at the foot of his mattress.

“I’m sick,” he hoarsely whispered.

“You’re a slacker.” She grabbed the corner of the duvet and yanked it down. “Get thee out of thy bed before I dost make you eat chicken for breakfast instead of sausage and bacon.”

He rolled over in the bed and treated her to a scruffy smile. “Bacon?”

She sighed in exasperation. Some days she felt like he was a cross between a six-year old and a dog. “Yes, I couldn’t stand one more day of your complaining about the food around here, so I talked to your trainer about adding in some variety and I’m making bacon for breakfast but if you’re not back from your run in time, I’ll eat it all myself.”

“You drive a hard bargain, Halla, my love,” he sat up and stretched and she turned away as the blanket fell down around his hips and the muscles in his stomach rippled, “but I accept.”

“And remind me to buy you some pyjama pants. I’ve had enough near-bush experiences with you to last a lifetime.”

The days all had the same basic rhythm. Make breakfast while he was gone, go over his schedule and lay out anything he would need for the day, and then eat breakfast with him when he got back as they went over his schedule and any messages she needed input on before she returned. He would go shower and dress, and then mornings were usually meetings of one type or another. She would make him eat his boring chicken for lunch, and then script work and more meetings and reviewing projects he was considering and everything else happened in the afternoon along with her shoehorning in two hours of weight training around things that couldn’t be moved. Keeping his flat clean and making sure he had clean pants all happened in the background.

She was doing her final check-in of the evening with Fassy when the doorbell rang. She yelled, “Come in.”

James walked into the living room where she was perched on the arm of the sofa going through her list of things she needed to discuss with Fassy. “Hey, Halla.”

“Hi, James. I’m just about to go, just give me another minute with him.”

“Of course.” He sprawled in one of the arm chairs.

“I’m going to the market tomorrow, so if you want anything other than the normal, make sure to jot it down for me. You’ve got an early meeting in the morning so I’ll be here at six to kick you out of bed. You know what that means.” She looked at Fassy over the edge of her glasses. She had picked this pair because they made her feel like a librarian.

“Yes, I need to get cookies.”

James looked confused. “Why do you need to get cookies?”

“She wrote it as a footnote on her contract and no one noticed before it got signed. If she has to be awake before six am to perform her contractually obligated duties, she gets a nap that afternoon. And chocolate chip cookies.”

James laughed. “You wrote chocolate chip cookies into your contract?”

“I didn’t think they would agree to it,” she said, hugging her tablet to her chest, “and the same clause applies to you if you ever make me get out of bed that early.”

“I’ll remember that.”

Halla looked back down at the iPad. “That’s it for today. I’m meeting with the new stylist this evening to go over proposals for both of your outfits so I’ll be reachable if either of you need anything.” She stood. “Have a fun night tonight, and James, make sure he’s home by midnight would you? He’s a pain in the arse to get out of bed on a good day.”

James nodded. “I’ll do my best, Halla.”

“Thanks.” She grabbed her purse, slipped her iPad into its sleeve, and headed for the door. “Good night, boys.”

“Good night, Halla.”

“Good night, Sassy.”

She wiggled her fingers at them without turning around and shut the door behind her.

James looked at Michael.

“What?” Michael pushed himself up off the couch where he had been laying.

“Sassy?”

“She calls me Fassy. I call her Sassy.”

James stroked his beard thoughtfully. “It’s odd that she thinks you’re difficult to get out of bed. You were always on set before I was. In fact, I would venture to go so far as to call you a morning person.”

“Shut up.”

“She’s cute.” James’s face radiated innocence.

“She’s our employee.”

“She’s still cute.”

Michael took a deep breath and slowly let it out as he fixed James with a quelling stare. “Can we go to dinner now?”

“Absolutely.”

***

Halla headed up the stairs to her flat, checking the messages on her mobile. She was halfway up the stairs when she noticed the man sitting on the landing, resting his back against her door.

“Henry?” She hadn’t heard from him in almost a month, since that single text. The feelings she thought had faded away dusted themselves off and stood at attention.

He lifted his slumping head at her voice. The normal light in his eyes was absent, and there was no hint of a smile. She hurried up the rest of the stairs. “What’s wrong?”

He rose to his feet. “I miss you, Halla.”

His words caused a flush to come to her cheeks. “I’ve missed you, too.”

“Can we talk?”

She unlocked the door and invited him in and they stood awkwardly in her small living room.

“What brings you here tonight?” she finally asked.

He fidgeted with his shirt, pulling at the fabric across his shoulders. “I’ve missed you, and you stopped taking my calls.”

“You called me?”

“You blocked my number.”

“No!” She stepped forward. “My number changed when I got my new job. They got me an iPhone so I could sync easier with their computers. I have an iPad now too.”

“Your boss must like you.”

She shook her head. “It just makes it easier if we’re all on the same platform. I didn’t block your number; I just took the other phone back. It was still under the five-day trial period.”

“Oh.” A hint of his normal confidence reappeared in him. His shoulders straightened and his chin lifted a bit. “You weren’t avoiding me?”

“No. I wouldn’t do that to you.” She looked down. “I wouldn’t hurt you like that.”

“Even after I hurt you?”

She didn’t say anything.

Henry gently touched her cheek. “I’m sorry I hurt you.”

She brushed her face against his hand. She had missed the feel of his hand and her eyes closed as she savored his touch. His lips brushed softly against hers and she turned her face up to the kiss as his hand slipped into her hair and he held her still as his mouth moved over hers. Halla whimpered at the feel of his mouth against hers after so long and wrapped her arms around his neck as Henry’s hand slid down her back, pressing her against him as it went until it came to rest in the small of her back.

The prickle of tears stung her eyes. She had given up hope for ever feeling the delight of his kisses again, and as he claimed her mouth once more the pleasure was almost painful. Her hands fell to the buttons on his shirt as they kissed. She wanted to touch more of him, to bind the two of them together. She undid the first button, and then the second, and then pressed her hand against his exposed chest. The hair tickled against her palm, but he radiated heat and she wanted more of it, to thaw the cold places his departure had caused in her heart.

She tugged his shirt from his jeans and Henry broke away from the kiss. “I don’t know how to have you in my life, Halla.”

She paused. “What do you mean?”

“I want this, and I want you, and I  _want_  to take your clothes off you and worship your body with my own. But there’s this whole other world out there and I love to go clubbing with my friends and listen to live music and watch rugby matches and drinking is part of that.” She let go of his shirt and stepped back. “I had two perfect dates with you, but I am so scared that I will cause you to start drinking again, and I would hate myself if I did that to you, but you’re asking me to give up so many things that I love.”

“I’m not asking for anything, Henry. We can date. We can still hang out together. I just can’t be around you while you’re drinking. I’m not strong enough for that.”

He took her face in his hands, staring at her intently. “Will you ever be?” His eyes searched her face, looking for an answer he desperately wanted to find. “Is there hope that you can get to the point where we can go to a match together and I can have a beer and you’ll be fine?”

“I don’t know. Some people can. Some people can’t.”

He dropped his hands and turned around, his fingers curving into talons as he growled in frustration. “Damnit, Halla. Why does this have to be so difficult?”

“I don’t know. And honestly, I wouldn’t blame you for running. You barely know me.”

He turned back to her. “But there’s  _us_ , Halla.” He grabbed her hand and held it tightly. “You felt it. You still feel it. We have something, but I don’t want to be in a relationship with someone who can only share part of my life.”

“Well, that’s your answer then.” She pulled her hand free and crossed her arms across her chest, rubbing her skin as if she were cold.

“But I don’t want that answer.”

Halla wanted to throw something at him but forced herself to remain calm. These are the same things she had yelled at her counselor when she was coming to terms with her addiction. “I can’t change it though. This is who I am, and I can’t separate the alcoholic part of me out to make my life easier or to make your life easier. Believe me, I wish I could.”

They stared at each other over the invisible wall between them, knowing that they were at an impasse. Finally, Henry started buttoning his shirt. “I shouldn’t have come.”

Halla’s head sank and she stared at the floor in front of her.

“I’m sorry, Halla.” He gently kissed the top of her head. “I shouldn’t have come.”

The door opened and closed, and he was gone.


	10. Chapter 10

The light filtered through the stained glass windows into the old converted church building. Halla stood in colored shadow as she faced the crowd of strangers arrayed before her on uncomfortable folding chairs.

“Hi, my name is Halla, and I’m an alcoholic.” The murmured greeting returned to her magnified thirty-fold. “Today is eleven months that I’ve been sober. I met a wonderful man who I really like. We went out to dinner and he had a beer with his meal and I wanted a drink almost bad enough to give in and have one myself. We’re not dating because he doesn’t want the restrictions on his life that being with an alcoholic would impose. I don’t blame him; I don’t want the restrictions on my life that being an alcoholic imposes. I wish I was like normal people, who can have just a drink or a glass of wine, but I’m not, and I never will be, and sometimes I question whether being sober is worth it. But then I think about where I was a year ago, and I know it is. Even when it sucks.”

***

The flashbulbs were blinding. Halla tried not to squint, but she had no idea how Fassy and James managed to do this on a regular basis without going blind. She stood off to the side and watched as the paparazzi yelled for them to look left and right and over here and can we get a smile. It seemed like it would be easier to just have one photographer take several shots and then release them into the public domain, but apparently that idea hadn’t occurred to anyone else. Instead, she could look forward to escorting her boys through this circus on a regular basis.

It was her first time at a premiere and she was treating this as a learning experience. Her guys weren’t the stars, but they would be soon, especially since she would be travelling with Fassy for  _Frank_  in a few weeks. She watched everything, committing to memory every detail of who went where and when. Eventually they were done posing for the cameras and they joined her.

“So, now where do you go?”

“Well, if we were in the film, we would go run that gauntlet over there,” James pointed at another blindingly well-lit area where camera crews and reporters were interviewing celebrities, “but since we’re not, we’re going to skip that and just go inside and see what they have to eat.”

“Well, you boys have fun.”

“You’re coming with us,” Fassy said.

Halla turned back around. “What?”

“You’re my plus one. I hate third-wheeling those two.”

She sighed heavily at him, wishing she had her glasses on so she could glare at him over the top of them. “It might have been nice if you had mentioned this before now. I could have had a hot date.”

“Do you?”

She looked down at her shoes, loving the look of the peep-toes and her sparkly pink pedicure. “Well, no.”

“Now you do. Come on.” He grabbed her hand and pulled her with them.

Halla shook her head as she followed the three into the theatre. The spacious lobby was filled with people swirling around and she had to keep herself from squealing as she saw a dozen celebrities she recognized in the first few seconds. This was her first big even as an assistant and she wanted to behave like a professional, like a lunatic.

She excused herself to visit the loo. When she came back out she headed to the bar to get a drink. She was so terrified of embarrassing herself in front of everyone and making her bosses look bad that her mouth had gone dry and her hands were shaking. As she waited for the bartender to get to her, she reached for one of the chocolate dipped cherries that were beautifully arranged on an alabaster platter when a hand closed around her wrist.

“I wouldn’t.”

She looked up to see Henry.

“Those are soaked in bourbon.”

“Oh.” She pulled her hand back and he let her go. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” He gestured for the bartender and got his immediate attention. “Cherry coke for the lady.”

She squinted up at him. “Do you get immediate service because you’re famous or because you’re huge?”

Henry grinned. “I think both help.”

Halla sighed. “I’m going to be scared to eat anything now.”

“Stay here. I’ll be right back.”

He hurried off and Halla stared after him, wondering what he had to do in such a hurry. The bartender handed her her drink and she moved over to a nearby cocktail table as she scanned the crowd looking for where James and Fassy had gotten to. She saw them going by the catering tables getting something to eat. She wished Henry would hurry because she was starving. She had been planning on eating dinner when she had gotten home, and the chocolate chip cookies were an ancient memory by now.

Henry showed up at her side and put a plate of food on the table. “I asked one of the catering staff for alcohol free food and they put this together for you.”

She stared at the food and then up at him. “How did you do that so quickly?”

His familiar grin was back in full power. “I abused the power of the chin dimple and the eye-matching shirt.”

Halla clapped her hand over her mouth so she wouldn’t laugh annoyingly loud. “On behalf of women everywhere I should scold you, but I’m just going to say thank you instead.”

He shrugged. “It was actually a man if that makes it any better.”

Halla shook her head in amusement as she picked up one of the little pork sliders. “So, why are you being so nice to me?” she asked, after she was done eating it.

“Because I want us to be friends even if we can’t be anything else. And I feel horrible about last night. And regardless of how my behavior looks over the last month, in general I’m not a douchecanoe, as you put it.”

He actually looked ashamed of himself as he fiddled with the little centerpiece on the table. It was like she had just smacked a puppy on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper. “Friends, huh?”

He didn’t raise his head, but he looked up at her. “If you think we can manage that.”

She could see hope dawning in his eyes. She pointed at him. “No blue shirts.”

“Deal.”

“Fine. We can be friends. I suppose I should give you my new number.” He handed her his mobile and she entered her information and then hit send. Her purse buzzed and she ended the call. “I am always mixing up the last two digits,” she explained as she handed the device back to him.

Halla fished the cherry out of her drink. “Have you figured out how to tie the stem yet?”

“No. I don’t normally order drinks with fruit in them.”

“Pity.”

“So, what are you doing here?”

She giggled at his complete bewilderment. “I’m on a date, apparently.”

“Really? Who is he?”

“My boss. He needed a plus one at the last minute.”

“You’re dating your boss?”

“Oh, god no. I was giving him grief about dumping this on me last minute and said that I might have a hot date and he said ‘well now you do.’”

Henry’s eyes narrowed as he licked his lips. “That’s kind of…creepy.”

Halla started laughing. “That’s just Fassy being himself.”

“Fassy?”

She nodded, “I’m working for Michael Fassbender.”

His eyes widened as his jaw slackened a little bit. “You’re here with Michael Fassbender?” he said in disbelief.

“Um, yeah, is that okay?” She wasn’t sure why he was reacting like that. He hung out with famous people all the time.

“Can I meet him?”

“You’re Superman, I’m pretty sure you can meet anyone you want.”

His mouth pursed in exasperation. “No, I mean, will you introduce me?”

“Are we suddenly living during the Regency? Sure, let me find them.”

Luckily they were walking her way. The three of them joined their small table, making a crowded group and Henry stepped back so he was partially behind Halla to make more room. “How did you get food before us?” James asked.

“I know people who abuse their superpowers for my benefit. Henry, these are my bosses Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy and his wife, Anne-Marie Duff. Michael, James, Anne-Marie, this is Henry Cavill.” They all exchanged greetings and then chit chatted about ‘I loved you in’ for a few minutes. About half way through the conversation Halla felt Henry’s hand on her back. Halla wondered if it was just a reaction to standing outside the group, or if we just touchy feely in general, or if this was some macho ownership thing. She wasn’t sure James or Fassy could even see what he was doing from this angle.

Henry finally said, “Well, I have some other people I need to talk to you. It was nice to meet all of you.”

They exchanged farewells. “Halla, I’ll call you?” He held his hand to his ear in the universal phone gesture.

“Sure. I’ll talk to you later. And thanks. For everything.” He kissed her on the cheek and left.

She turned back to the table and was met with a sea of expectant faces. “What?” she asked, as she became fascinated with the toasted ravioli on her plate.

“So,” James drew out the word, “how did you two meet?”

“Henry and I? We shared a cab in a rain storm once.”

“Good. Good.” He didn’t say anything else but just looked at her, waiting for her to break.

She stared back at him and very loudly slurped the last of her coke through the straw.

Anne-Marie started laughing. “You might as well tell him. He’s worse than a rat terrier when he gets wind of something.”

“There’s not much to tell. We dated a few times, it didn’t work out, we’re still friends.”

“Why didn’t it work out?” Fassy asked.

“Because he was too big and it wouldn’t fit.” The other three all choked on their food and Halla started laughing. “It just didn’t work out; I’m a difficult one to date. Is that enough information?”

James nodded. “Remind me never to ask you questions while I’m eating again.”

The doors into the theatre opened and people slowly started filing in. There were tables full of glass bottles of Coke and souvenir metal buckets of popcorn in various flavors. The four of them found seats together and she ended up sitting between the two men. She took a bite of her caramel corn.

“This is  _good_. Do you guys always get good popcorn like this at these things?”

“There’s always some sort of treat.” James responded. “What flavor did you get?”

“Caramel corn.”

“Care for some Maple Bacon?”

“Possibly.” She took a handful.

The four of them swapped containers of popcorn until they had tried all their flavors, and they all pronounced the chili lime their least favorite.

“Fassy,” Halla whispered a few minutes later.

“What?”

“Go get me some more caramel corn.”

His grin didn’t seem so shark-like any more. “Aren’t you my assistant?”

“That’s a nice way to talk to your date.” She pouted at him, sticking out her bottom lip.

He rolled his eyes. “Fine.” He came back a few minutes later with four more containers of popcorn and a gleeful smile. “They had new ones.” He handed out the buckets. “White chocolate with almonds, dark chocolate with cranberries, wasabi, and caramel for Sassy.”

“Hey, maybe I want some of that dark chocolate kind.”

“Well, then you better be nice to me,” Fassy said.

“Fine, if I have to.”

They sat through the opening remarks and the movie finally started. She leaned over to Fassy. “I have no idea what this movie is about.”

“I don’t either,” he whispered back.

“Then why are we here?”

“Because they have really good popcorn.”

She turned to reply but he was still facing her, leaning over so he could whisper in her ear, and their faces almost collided. They stared at each other awkwardly, millimeters apart for a few seconds, before Halla snapped her head back around and fixed her unblinking eyes on the screen.

_He is your boss. He is YOUR BOSS. And he’s OLD. He’s like, a decade older than you. Okay, that’s not that old, but still, BOSS. BOOOOOOSSSSSS. Ignore that you have suddenly realized he’s hot. He’s your boss. BOSS BOSS BOSS. You do NOT want to fuck this up, Halla. This is the best opportunity you’ve had since the observatory booted you. BOSS. OLD and BOSS._

She shot a look at him out of the corner of her eye. He was watching the movie as if nothing had happened.  _Good. Take a deep breath and eat your damn popcorn._

That plan worked for a while until the psychological thriller turned bloody. At the first big scare, she screamed and jumped in her seat. She slapped both hands over her mouth as her face flamed in embarrassment. She looked over at James to see him holding the side of his fist against his mouth not to laugh. She didn’t even have to look at Fassy to see his shoulders shaking. She slumped down in her seat. They were never going to take her to one of these things again.  _Goodbye, delicious popcorn._

When it turned brutal, she squeezed her eyes shut. Fassy put his arm around the back of her chair and leaned over. “Do you need to go get some air?” he whispered.

She shook her head. “Just tell me when I can look again.”

As she heard the sound of bone breaking she tensed up, her shoulders rising around her ears, her hands turning into fists. Fassy took her hand and stroked it until she relaxed. He finally leaned over and whispered, “It’s safe to look.” He didn’t let go of her hand but instead stroked his thumb over the back of it whenever the action started getting intense.

The movie eventually ended, and Halla pulled her hand back as the lights came up. There was applause and more speeches and more applause, but they eventually made their way back out of the theatre into the cold night air.

“Afterparty?” James asked.

“I think I’m going to head home,” Halla replied.

“Oh, come with us,” Fassy said.

“I really need to go.”

“Is it because Henry will be there?” James asked. Fassy’s nostrils flared slightly at the question.

“No, it’s because I survived one open bar tonight, and I’m not going to press my luck.”

“Ah.” James bit his lips and looked away. “Right. Okay then.”

She turned to Michael. “So, are you going to need a few extra hours of sleep in the morning?”

Fassy shook his head. “I don’t plan on staying out very late.”

“Alright, I’ll see you tomorrow.” They got in separate taxis, and she told the driver to take her to Michael’s flat.

When Fassy got home around one, the light from the windows illuminated something sitting on his bed that hadn’t been there when they had all left together several hours earlier. He flipped on the light and picked up the piece of paper that was sitting on top of some clothes.

_Fassy,_

_I bought you pyjama pants. I swear to everything I hold holy, if you do not wear them, I won’t even let you have salt for your chicken for a month._

_Sassy_

Fassy laughed harder at the note than at anything anyone had said all night. _Sassy indeed._


	11. Chapter 11

Halla opened the door to Fassy’s bedroom and stared at the bed. He was sprawled on his stomach, his heavy breathing just short of a snore. She walked over to the bed, flipped up the corner of the duvet, and was relieved to see that his leg was clad in blue striped cotton. She flipped the grey blanket back down and went to open the curtains.

“Time to get up, cupcake. Got to run off the popcorn.”

*** 

Halla pushed away her empty breakfast plate and stirred her coffee absentmindedly as she looked at the list of things she needed to do today. “There is a big change to your schedule for the next few weeks. The producers of  _Frank_  booked a gig for you guys in Rotterdam the night before the film festival opens, so you and Dom and everyone are going to have to get together and rehearse.”

“That’s great.” Everything was always great when he got bacon for breakfast. Halla could still taste the blueberry muffin she had eaten on the way here this morning. Next time he pissed her off she was just going to yell, “Oh yeah? Well, I had carbs for breakfast!”

She flipped out the expanding page of his monthly schedule. “You’re just getting a little crowded. How much time do you think you will need to put together a show?”

He sat back in his chair, balancing it on its back legs. “I’m not sure. I’d guess a week of rehearsals. Maybe a practice gig to work things out in front of an audience.”

“Right. I’ll start looking for a practice space and a sympathetic club owner.”

He let the chair drop loudly back onto four legs. “The production company should do that.”

“Yes, well, they seemed more than inclined to just let me do it, since I know when and where you’ll be available.”

“Do you want me to call them?”

“I’m perfectly capable of talking on the phone by myself, thank you.” She jotted down a few notes on her daily list. “Now that I know what you want, I’ll go get it for you. Do you want the giant papier-mâché head too?”

“Definitely.”

“Of course you do. Go shower. I’ll call Dom and start massaging schedules.” He got up and dumped his plate in the sink. “And don’t take forever in there,” she called after his retreating form. “You’re due at read-throughs for  _MacBeth_ in an hour and a half.”

*** 

Michael came back downstairs about forty-five minutes later as he was buttoning his shirt. He stopped at the foot of the stairs as he heard Halla talking.

“I need a rehearsal space available every weekday starting this Monday until we leave for Rotterdam from one to four. And the instruments they will be playing along with all the other gear they need must be there on Monday properly set up, and I want a sound tech there every day as well.”

Halla’s heels clicked on the floor as she paced the kitchen.

“I don’t know, you haven’t given me his itinerary yet, which is something else I need.”

There was a long pause as Halla listened to the other person. He looked in the kitchen to see her standing at the opposite side, her things spread out on the counter before her in the sunlight streaming in the windows. She was scribbling something on her ever-present notepad and then stopped as she started to speak again. “No, you booked this gig for the night before the actual film festival starts, so as far as I’m concerned, you abrogated the terms of his contract and he could tell you no, in much less polite terms than I would, and be fully within his rights to do so. Therefore, I suggest you organize the things he and the other actors need to get ready for this publicity stunt before their agents all call you with bills for additional services rendered.”

The pen she had been gesticulating with paused as she stopped to listen. “No, I’m not his agent.”

Another pause. “We also need the papier-mâché head.”

She started writing things down again. “No, I don’t know where it is. I would check with the properties supervisor.”

She made quite a sight in the sunshine. It brought warmth to her normally cold coloring, and made her hair shine like platinum.  Her fuchsia jumper clung to her small frame, and the dark grey trousers highlighted her arse to perfection. James had called her cute, and that was the word Michael would have used to describe her until now as he listened to her take on the production company.  She was powerful. What normally came across as sass was channeled with a much different purpose as she looked out for his interests. “I’ll book the gig here. I have a lead on the spot, but I will need that itinerary as soon as possible, so I know when to book it to give you enough time to have the shakily filmed anonymous video of it go viral on YouTube before their actual performance in Rotterdam.”

She turned around and saw him standing in the door way and held up one finger.

“Of course that’s what you’ll do. I would if I were in your shoes.”

“I will let you know where and when the gig is. And I’ll expect the itinerary and the booking information this afternoon. Mm-hmm. Thank you. Bye.”

She ended the call and kicked off her heels.

“You put your shoes on to talk on the phone?”

“The extra height makes me feel more powerful. When you’re as little as I am, you learn to compensate in all sorts of ways.”

He eyeballed her speculatively, and then held his hand out level with her head and drew it across to him where it touched the middle of his chest. “You are rather short. I could put my chin on top of your head if I wanted.”

She looked at him over the top of those librarian glasses she liked to wear. Between the glasses and her hair up in a bun and the fuzzy sweater, it had an entirely different effect on him than the quelling glare she was attempting. “Technically, yes. For your own health and safety, I wouldn’t recommend it.”

“You’re even feistier this morning than normal.”  He went over to the stove where a few extra pieces of bacon were resting on a plate. He reached for one and Halla smacked his hand. “So, how did you know they were in breach of contract? Or was that a bluff.”

She crossed to the fridge and got out his steel water bottle. “I read your contracts.” She pushed the bottle against his chest, hoping the chill would make him finish buttoning his shirt.

He gasped at the sudden cold. “Why would you read those?” He barely read his contracts.

She arched an eyebrow at him. He wondered if he should tell her she looked like a naughty librarian but decided against it. “Because I needed to put together a calendar for you and your method of sticky notes on the wall wasn’t working so hot.”

Now that she mentioned it, he realized he hadn’t seen his improvised calendar in a while. “Speaking of which, where are those?”

“The sticky notes got tossed in the rubbish. The contracts are now in the previously empty cabinet in your office under C for contracts and then in individual files by project, with the most recent addendums at the front.”

“Oooh, addendums. You’re using all the big words this morning. And where did you learn to throw around terms like ‘abrogation of contract’?” Her insistent professionalism this morning irritated him. He wanted to ask her about last night, about if she fell asleep remembering the feel of his hand on hers.

Her eyes narrowed slightly at the odd tone in his voice. Why was he being such a jerk about her having a vocabulary above that of the average chav? “I’ve been reading books about the film industry, legal contracts, and things like that and I’ve been taking an online course in contract negotiation.”

That set him back on his heels. “When do you find time for all that?”

“When you’re in all your meetings. What do you think I’m doing on my iPad over in the corner?” She went back to the counter and started packing her things so they could leave.

“Shopping?” he offered. He hadn’t really thought about what she did when she was waiting for him.

Halla sighed and put her shoes back on. “Ready to go? The car service should be here in a few minutes.”

“Did I offend you?”

She turned around so she was looking at him and leaned back against the counter, crossing her arms across her chest. “When I’m with you, I’m working for you, and if there’s nothing that needs to be done at the moment, I try and work on professional development. You and James handed me a life-changing opportunity and I don’t want to disappoint you.”

He walked across the kitchen to her. “I doubt you could disappoint anyone, Halla.”

“I have been nothing but a disappointment for the last five years.” Her resigned acceptance of that fact enraged him.

He stepped closer to her, close enough she had to tilt her head back to look at him. “You don’t disappoint me, Halla.”

“And you’ve been a pretty good boss, all things considered. You haven’t called me at three am because you’re running low on paper in the loo, I usually have my weekends off except for legitimate reasons, and even when  you do impose, I get really good popcorn out of the deal.”

“You’ve changed my life.”

She smiled politely. “Just fighting the ever constant war against the forces of entropy in the universe.”

“I mean it. My life is better because you’re in it.”

“I’ll take that as a satisfactory employee evaluation.”

He grabbed her face, forcing himself to gentle his touch and his expression as her eyes widened in shock. “Stop deflecting and take a damn compliment. I like having you in my life. I like  _you_.”

He watched as her lips moved, searching for words to say. She was speechless for several seconds, not knowing how to process the conflicting signals coursing through her body. He was nice and handsome and radiated enough sex appeal to power a small industrialized nation. But he was also her boss, and she was almost positive that fucking him would fuck it all up, and she didn’t have any other options after this. She needed this job more than she needed a lay.

A knock sounded at the door. “That must be the car service. We should go.”

He let go of her and stepped back. “Then let’s go.”

***

_What’s the name of that place you took me for dinner? Martins? Something like that._

**The Miller.**

_Right! Do they do live music there during the week or just at the weekend?_

**Mostly just the weekend, but it probably depends on who they can book. Why? Did you start a band?**

_No :D  Fassy plays a musician in his movie that’s debuting in a few weeks in Rotterdam and they are going to do a show and I need to find them a place to perform._

**You want to book them into The Miller?**

_Do you think it will work?_

**I don’t see why not. It should bring in quite a crowd just for the novelty factor.**

_Thank you! I’ll call them._

**Hey, one of the old theatres downtown is doing a midnight showing of _Blood and Chrome_ tonight. You want to go be a geek with me?**

_Frak yes!_

**J I’ll pick you up around eleven?**

_Sounds like a plan. See you tonight._

_***_

Halla opened the door a few minutes after eleven. “I approve of the shirt. That’s a horrible color on you.”

He grinned at her. “Thanks. You look atrocious yourself.” He paused for a second as he squinted at the design on her t-shirt. “Is that a toaster with a Cylon emblem on it?”

Halla giggled. “Yep.”

“It’s official. You’re a bigger nerd than I am.”

“I don’t think I’m bigger. I just have more concentrated nerdy goodness.”

A smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. “Whatever you need to call it to make you feel better about yourself. You ready?”

“Yep.” She locked the door and he tugged the handle to make sure it was secure.

He helped her into his auto. “Nice car,” she said, when he got in the drivers’ seat. “I feel like I’m in a race or something.”

“It never really gets to show itself off in the city. We should go out for a drive sometime, let her show off her paces.”

“That would be fun.”

They chatted about the movie from last night’s premiere as they drove to the theatre. Henry finally looked over at Halla and said, “So, was that you who screamed?”

She sank in the seat, feeling the same embarrassment she had felt the night before. “Oh god, you could tell?”

Henry started laughing at her dismay. “I thought it sounded like you.”

“I swear those two are never going to take me to another premiere.”

He looked over at her and saw how badly she felt. “It was cute.”

Halla screwed up her face in disbelief. “Yeah, whatever.”

“Besides, it makes the filmmakers happy when they get a reaction like that.”

“Right. Well, they must have been jubilant.”

When they got inside the theatre, they found seats in the center of a row half way back. Halla sat down and then turned to look at him. “Do they make you pay for an extra seat on an aeroplane?”

“No, why?”

“You have big shoulders. It’s a good thing I’m so tiny or I wouldn’t fit.”

He chuckled and draped his arm over the back of the seat. “Is that better?”

She wriggled around and then bounced once. “Yep.”

Henry shook his head, silent laughter racking his frame.

“What?”

“You’re like three parts cat, one part unicorn, and two parts fairy dust.”

Halla felt oddly flattered. “That is probably the most accurate description anyone has ever given of me.”

“Though I must admit, I’m a little disappointed that you aren’t wearing any pink.”

“That you can see.” She leered at him, her eyebrows waggling up and down.

“Ah. Yes. Right.” He took a drink of his Coke.

“Are you blushing?” She got really close to his face. “You’re blushing. OH my god, and you call  _me_ adorable.”

He tried to look at her reprovingly but he couldn’t keep a straight face.

“Your cheeks are all round and shiny and  _pink!_ ”

“Eat your popcorn, Halla.”

She snickered and did what she was told. “This isn’t as good as last night’s,” she said, shoulders slouching.

“I know, that was pretty good stuff, right?”

Halla giggled and the movie started. She rested her head on his shoulder as they watched the movie together. He left his arm stretched out on the back of the seats instead of wrapping it around her shoulders and she didn’t steal his drink.

He walked her up to her door at the end of the night. “You want to go race cars next weekend?”

“Really? That would be so much fun!”

“Let me see what I can arrange and I’ll give you a call.”

“I look forward to it.”

He abruptly hugged her tightly, his head resting on top of hers, and she hugged him back. He held her for a few seconds and then kissed her on top of her head. “Sleep well, and I’ll call you, okay?”

She nodded and opened her door. He waited until it was shut and locked before he left. He hated that she lived here even though he knew he couldn’t do anything about it except make sure she locked her door. It’s not like he could hire a bodyguard for her.

Halla flung herself down on her bed and kicked her shoes off. She smiled at the ceiling at the idea of having a friend again. All her previous friends had abandoned her when she had gotten sober and the last eleven months had been very lonely. A good job, a friend, and hope for a better future. Things were definitely looking up.


	12. Chapter 12

Halla stood in the back of the crowded room, listening to Fassy and his costars tear up the stage. They were having the time of their lives and the packed audience loved it. Even as sick as she was of their music after three weeks of rehearsals, she was still buzzing on the energy vibrating through the room. Henry was around here somewhere; he had come with some of his friends and had chatted with her before the concert had started. They had been hanging out a few times a week since their midnight movie outing and texted back and forth regularly. Periodically he would ring her up, tell her a stupid joke, and then end the call while she was still laughing.

Halla swallowed against the rising queasiness in her stomach. The room had been getting warmer over the course of the evening and the smell of spilled beer and sweaty bodies cooking under the overhead spotlights was getting to her. The crowed swirled and swayed and every person had a drink in their hand. Unbidden memories of her days embedded in the midst of every dancing crowd crept into her mind and began to sway in time to the music. The song came to a thundering conclusion and the audience cheered. She knew there were three more songs in the set and then an encore and she decided to take the opportunity to get some fresh air before anything bad happened.

Halla squeezed her way along the back wall and then down the stairs. She snuck back through the busy kitchen and out the back doors which were propped open to help cool the steaming workspace. The cold air slapped her in the face as she stepped out onto the loading dock. A busboy was having a smoke while leaning against the metal railing and he held out the pack in offer. She hesitated and then grabbed one and lit it off of his stub. He dropped his in the coffee can ashtray and with a nod headed back into work. She sat on the picnic table and inhaled a long drag, and then let out a slow trail of white smoke into the dark sky.

Her shoulders loosened as she took another deep breath, savoring the smoke filling her lungs. She closed her eyes as she blew it out.

“Are you okay?”

Henry was standing in front of her, hands on his hips. He looked sallow under the halogen lights; with her coloring she knew she looked ghastly. “What are you doing out here?” she asked.

“I saw you turn pale and run down the stairs. I remember that look.”

She smiled. “Just need some fresh air.”

“I don’t think that cigarette is going to help.”

She stuck her tongue out at him and took another drag.

“I didn’t know you smoked.”

She blew out a smoke ring. “I don’t.” She watched the smoke dissipate in the cold air, adding a few more traces of carbon and tar to the grey cinder block walls that surrounded them.

“That’s a pretty convincing magic trick, then.”

“I used to when I would go to pubs. Bum a cigarette off a friend at some point during the night to have with my last drink.”

Henry plucked the cigarette from her fingers and dropped it on the dirty cement where he ground it out under his boot. “That’s not a good idea, Halla.”

She knew it wasn’t, but she scowled at him for saying it. “Whatever.”

He just folded his arms across his chest and watched her placidly.

“Yes, I know. Alright? I shouldn’t do anything that I associate with drinking. It’s a bad step and I should probably call my sponsor.”

“You do AA?”

“Four times a week, but I’ve been missing meetings lately because work has been so crazy.”

He sat next to her on the table, their feet resting side by side on the wobbling bench. “You should tell your boss. Let him know you need time to go to your meetings.”

She pulled out her mobile and started typing in an address.

“What are you doing?”

“Looking to see if there’s a midnight meeting around here somewhere I can go to when this gig is done.”

“You could make an earlier one. I think they have to shut down amplified music at 10pm.”

“Yeah, but I have to supervise the breakdown of the equipment and make sure it all gets packed correctly to be shipped to Rotterdam.” Halla’s eyes widened. She turned and looked behind her and swore.

“What’s wrong?” Henry asked.

“The van’s gone.”

“What van?”

“The transport van. It was parked back here and now it’s gone.” She scrambled off the table and jumped down the steps, running over to where it had last been and then checking to see if it had been moved around the corner.

She turned and went down the cross street and Henry went after her, skirting the puddles that pockmarked the cracking asphalt. He didn’t want her running around an alley in the dark by herself. “Where did you put the keys to it?”

“I don’t have the keys! There were a couple guys from the production company. They came and set up all the gear for the sound check earlier, but the van was here when I got here.”

“Do you have a number for the driver?”

She climbed back up on the dock and pulled her planner out of her purse and flipped to the day’s pages. She ran a finger down a long list of names in the furthest right column and then punched up that name in her phone.

“Hello? Yes, this is Halla Jónsdóttir. I’m calling about you picking up the musical instruments from The Miller this evening.”

“No, they have to be picked up this evening.”

“Who told you that you could pick them up in the morning?”

She looked at Henry and rolled her eyes. “I’m sorry that Mr. Fassbender told you that you could pick them up in the morning, but they have to be picked up tonight.”

“I’m sorry that you’re going to have to go back out now that you’re already home, but the contract said that they had to be picked up and packed this evening.”

“Yes, I know that working these hours means you will have to be compensated extra. That was specified in the same contract that said the instruments get picked up tonight.” She sat back down on the table.

“It’s going to take you how long to get here?”

“That’s unacceptable. I need someone here in 45 minutes.”

“Well, if you hadn’t tried to deviate from the terms in your contract this wouldn’t be a problem now, would it?”

Henry sat back down on the table and stroked his hand soothingly up and down her back.

“That’s right. You better be here in 45 minutes or I’m enacting the penalties in your contract. Bye.”

She punched the little red button and threw the phone back in her purse. “I’m going to kill him,” she muttered as she rested her head on her hands. “I’m just going to tell him he isn’t allowed to say anything that isn’t written in a script and approved by me. It would make my life easier.”

“At least you caught the mistake before the show was over.”

“You’re right, it could have been worse.” She leaned over and rested her head against the side of his shoulder. “Why do you smell like peppermint?”

He stuck his tongue out showing a red and white striped candy. “I thought it might help with the beer breath.”

“That was nice of you. It actually seems to be working. You don’t smell very berry. I mean beery. Very beery is hard to say. Total tongue twister.”

Henry chuckled. “I hate those things. Toy boat and Polly picking peppers and Sally and her fucking seashells.”

 “Stupid seashells.” She mimed a kicking motion. “Nobody wants them anyway. I would kill for a week at the seashore, though. Not our seashore. Warm sunny beachy seashore with coconuts with little umbrellas in them.”

“Do the umbrellas make the drinks taste better?”

“No, but I firmly believe that more drinks should come with Barbie accessories.”

His mouth quirked in a smile. “Um, that’s not a big selling point for me.”

She smacked him in the arm. “Your Superman doll would look  _fantastic_  with a pink umbrella.”

“It’s not a doll. It’s an action figure.”

She slowly shook her head. “It’s a doll, and I’ve seen you play with dolls, so don’t even start with the macho routine, mister.”

“That’s not a doll, it’s a toon or an avatar.”

“Doll. Doooolllllll. Dolldolldolldolldoll,” Her mantra was cut off by laughter as Henry grabbed her waist and started tickling her. “No fair!” She squealed. “You know my weak spots.”

He let her go and she giggled as she smoothed her shirt back into place. She leaned against him again. “I am just tired, and this festival is going to be crazy, and the flight isn’t even long enough to sleep on. We’re seriously going to spend more time in the airports than on the plane.”

“Get a boat.”

“Maybe next time I will. Of course, boat in January doesn’t sound much fun in the English Channel. Not to mention I don’t know anyone who can sail.”

“Um, hello?”

Her nose wrinkled in disbelief. “You can sail?”

“I’m from Jersey. You kind of grow up on the water there.”

“Oh yeaaaaaaah, I keep forgetting you’re one of those Frenchy Brits.”

She giggled as his eyebrow rose and his chin lowered. “Frenchy Brits?”

“Can you do that with the other eyebrow?”

“Do what?”

“That thing where you make it go up and down by itself.”

He paused and then tried to do it but he couldn’t get the other one to move much without closing his dominant eye. Halla dissolved into giggles at the contortions his face made and finally put her fingers on his forehead to keep the eyebrow from moving. “Now try.”

“You try it, Gigglebutt.”

She snorted with laughter. “Alright, I will.” She took a deep breath to calm herself and then tried to move her eyebrows. Henry made it just a few seconds before he started laughing as she kept trying to stare up at her forehead and she couldn’t get her eyebrows to move separately. Finally she put her hand over her eyes. “That makes my head hurt.”

“Not as easy as it looks, is it.”

“No, it’s not. I will now find it much more impressive when you look at me like that.”

He nodded. “As you should.”

Fassy stuck his head out the kitchen door. “There you are. Why’d you bail on the show?”

“I needed some fresh air.”

“Is that all you needed?”

She felt Henry stiffen beside her at the snide tone in Fassy’s voice. “What are you implying?”

“You’re supposed to be working and I find you out here flirting.”

Halla stepped down off the table and stalked over to him. “One, I’m not flirting, I’m talking to a friend. Two, even if I were flirting, it’s none of your god damn business. And three, it’s a good thing I came out here so I could discover the mistake you made and fix it before it screwed up everyone’s schedule.”

“What mistake did I make?” He put his hands on his hips as he met her glare.

She stabbed him in the chest with her finger. “You told the set crew they didn’t have to come back until tomorrow. That’s wrong. We can’t leave the equipment here because there’s no place to store it safely and it could get damaged or stolen. So unless you plan on sitting your arse on it until 11:00am tomorrow, it needs to get broken down and packed tonight. So I called them and made them come back. Who’s with the gear right now?”

“Dom.”

“Well, at least someone has the good sense not to leave it unattended. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go check the breakdown list.” She brushed past him and back into the kitchen.

Henry slowly stood up, and the two men regarded each other warily. “You need to lighten up on her a bit. She’s exhausted and she’s missing her AA meetings to keep your schedule running smoothly, and you asked her to stand around in a pub surrounded by booze for hours. She came out here because she could feel her control slipping and needed to get away from it.”

“Oh.” Fassy hadn’t even considered that aspect of the gig. She had never mentioned her concerns about merely being around alcohol and hadn’t considered the effect it would have on her. “Thanks for telling me.”

“Don’t tell her I told you, but she’ll need a little bit of extra looking out for the next few days until she gets it out of her system. And she wants to go to a meeting tonight, but she might not be able to because of the screw up with the break-down crew.”

“They have them this late?”

Henry shrugged. He was a stranger to how AA worked as well. “She was looking them up on some app on her phone.”

“Okay. I’ll go apologize and tell her to take off and I’ll stay with the instruments. That way she can go without knowing you told me.”

“Thanks.”

Fassy turned around and headed back into the restaurant. Henry ran both hands through his hair in frustration. He couldn’t get Halla out of his system. Being friends was good, but it wasn’t enough. He knew that sooner or later he was going to have to make a choice, and the more he thought about it, the sooner he thought it would have to be.

 


	13. Chapter 13

Halla stood on the hotel room balcony looking out at the night sky. The stars were few and scattered, but the lights dotting the bridges and buildings built a starscape at her feet. She was trying to get her brain to shut off from its endless review of the next day’s schedule. Tomorrow was the fourth day of the festival and the first of two important ones for Fassy. Photocalls and the press screening and then a panel interview and then the day after that would be the red carpet and full premiere. At least the concert had gone off without a hitch and had garnered buzz as a fun and vivacious performance.

She closed her eyes when she heard Fassy come up behind her. “What are you doing out here?”

“Just looking at the skyline. I’ve never been to Rotterdam before and it’s gorgeous at night.”

He stepped up behind her and rubbed his hands up and down her bare arms. “Aren’t you cold?”

“I was born in Iceland. I don’t think I’m allowed to get cold unless I’m on a glacier.”

He shed his jacket and draped it around her shoulders and she tugged it tighter. “You’re going to get cold now.”

He leaned forward so his soft words brushed against her ear. “It doesn’t matter as long as you’re warm.”

“Fassy, don’t.”

“What?”

“Don’t do this.”

He stepped in front of her. “This? Tell you how much I care for you? Actually make you listen to me for once instead of coming up with a thousand different items that have to be addressed at this minute?”

“Yes.”

“Why not?”

She closed her eyes, her hand rubbing at her forehead tiredly. “Because I don’t want to hear it.”

“Why not? Am I that repugnant to you?”

Her head felt like it was in a vice as she looked at him. “Because you’re my boss. That’s why.”

“I don’t think of myself as your boss. We’re colleagues. Friends.

She stepped back from him, needing the extra space so she couldn’t feel the pull he had on her and also so she didn’t have to look up as far to see him. “That’s nice that you don’t think of yourself as my boss. I, however, think of you as my boss, and it makes a big difference to me.”

“Why? Why does it make a difference? We spend all of our time together anyway. You tell me what to do every minute I’m awake. I’m not a boss.”

“But you are. You’re my boss. You want us to date, right? Not just a fuck to get it out of your system?”

He nodded.

“So say we date, right? And say it goes really well and you ask me to move in with you. What happens then? What happens when I get pissed because you keep leaving your wet towels on the floor even when I’ve asked you three times that week to hang them back up or at least leave them in the hamper? Does your girlfriend get to chuck the soggy mess at your head, or does your assistant clean up after you? What if I’m tired and I don’t feel like going to the market. Do I do it anyway because it’s my job or do I ask my boyfriend to go pick up a loaf of bread and some milk? What about all those little things I do right now that you don’t even notice. Is that just being a good employee or is that a girlfriend who gets resentful because you never say thank you. Don’t you understand? Of course you like me right now. I’m paid to make your life easier and do all the shit that you don’t want to. Why wouldn’t you like me? I’m some 1950s housewife who spends sixty hours a week catering to your every whim. I’m a shell you’ve projected all these emotions onto but you don’t even know who I am. You like a fiction you’ve concocted in your head.

“I like you.”

She crossed her arms over her chest even though she wanted to shake him until he listened to her. “You don’t even know me.”

“I know you, Halla. Better than you think.”

“Prove it.”

He leaned against the balcony railing. “How?”

“Tell me something about myself.”

“You’re an alcoholic.”

“Ooooh, good start.” She practically choked on her own sarcasm.

“You wear a lot of pink.”

“Another brilliant observation.”

He stepped forward. “You’re beautiful.”

“Generic.”

“You’re smart.” Another step towards her.

She fought the urge to step back from him. She was not going to cede ground or the argument. “Also generic. I told you. You don’t know me. I’m a shell. You don’t know how many siblings I have or where I went to university or what I read or where I worked. You don’t know what I listen to when I’m having a bad day or my favorite movie or my favorite food or any of that.”

“Fine. I don’t know a lot of facts about you. I can learn those. But I know you. I know that you give change to homeless people even though I’m pretty sure you’re living on a tight budget. I know that you play with your hair when you’re reading, and that when you’re twirling it clockwise you’re fine, but if you’re twirling it widdershins whatever it is you’re reading is upsetting you. I know that you put your hair up and take it down at least fifteen times a day and that I find your hair ties left all over my flat like a squirrel’s forgotten stashes of acorns and I want to know what other things you would scatter all over my house if it became our house. I like that on those days when you’ve had to get up early and you take a nap while I’m at the gym that I stare at my bed before I go to sleep wondering if that is where you slept. I like being able to tell which days you ate a muffin on the way to my flat by how many times I can ignore you when you wake me up before you get cranky. I should hate that my favorite part of the weekend is now when I go to sleep Sunday night because I know that means I’ll see you when I wake up, but I don’t. I don’t know your middle name or if you like cats or dogs better, but I want to hold your hand during the scary part of movies and I want to hold the rest of you while you sleep at night and I want you to believe me when I say I like you and your weird habit of never making your coffee the same way twice and that you say bless you when strangers sneeze and that for some reason I haven’t figured out yet you do a little dance while the microwave is on that you never do at any other time and I wonder at night if you have other activity specific dances that I haven’t seen, or if there’s something special about the microwave that makes you dance.

He stepped closer to her. “I know you and I like you and we can sort all the rest of that stuff out if you give me a chance. If you give  _us_ a chance.

Halla didn’t know what to say. She didn’t even realize that she twisted her hair in different directions depending on what she was reading, and his heartfelt tirade had knocked the feet out from under her argument that he liked some image he had created. She wanted to believe him, desperately wanted to believe him, and even more importantly believe that she could have some sort of a relationship again with someone who cared about her even when she was sober. He slowly leaned in to kiss her, giving her time to refuse or to push him away and she didn’t stop him.

Their lips touched, and the noise of the city below faded. Her chest ached at the tenderness of his kiss, as if she were the most fragile thing in his world and he was scared of breaking her. He pulled back, his eyebrows raised the slightest degree in silent question, and her shuddering breath was his answer. He kissed her again, and this time his jacket slid from her shoulders unheeded as she wound her arms around his neck.

His lips moved against hers with more pressure this time, more confident that she would not disappear like a mirage if disturbed, and every time their lips touched the caress lengthened until they were not kissing, they were a kiss. The pale fragile strands of starshine wove themselves into a net that draped over her, burning like white fire as his hands stroked her back, pulling her closer to him. The smooth velvet slide of his lips as his head tilted made her shiver and she parted her lips for him, for his tongue, for the ghost of her fears that she wanted to exhale, never to be seen again.

Their tongues touched and her heart stopped for a long moment before it skittered to life again at a much faster pace. He was heat and fire and change and everywhere his fingers touched lightning struck, and she burned like an inferno out of control. His hands slid from her back to her sides, and his thumbs stroked the outer curve of her breasts and she sighed his name.  _“Michael.”_

He fought back a grin of triumph as he trailed his mouth across her jaw. She had called him by his name, not Fassy, but Michael. She wanted him and he knew it deep in his stomach where the heat was started to coil like a python. He slowly backed her up as he kissed at her neck. Her pale skin had always fascinated him, and he had often wondered if it was as cold as it looked, but she was warm and soft to the touch. It showed the slightest mark, he realized, as his open mouthed kisses left a faint trail on her throat that was visible in the subdued lighting that shone from their suite. One more step and he pressed her up against the wall and the little noise of surprise she made as the cold brick rubbed against her back turned into a moan as he licked his way slowly back up her throat.

His mouth captured hers again as he cupped her breast, his thumb resting over the nipple he could feel peaking under his touch. He swallowed her moan and started circling the hardening nub as he slid his other hand to her hip. He squeezed the soft curve and she rubbed against him and he slid his hand to her bottom and pulled her closer.

Halla hooked her leg around the back of his thigh, wanting to be even closer to him. She ground against him slowly and nipped at his lip as she felt him stir to life. His hand tightened on her rear and set her hips into a slow rocking motion as he started to grind into her. She wished she were taller, and she canted her hips upward as they moved, wanting to feel his hardening length rubbing right at the apex of her thighs.

It was her turn to explore the contours of his throat and she slowly kissed his chin and his jaw and down his neck. She nipped at his skin, tugging it with her teeth and he moaned her name, his voice soft and deep and it added fuel to the fire burning within her. His hand slid down her leg until it met stocking instead of skirt and then slid back up under her dress. He squeezed her thigh, massaging gently as his hand worked his way up her leg. He groaned as he felt the lace at the top of her stocking and discovered the bare skin above it.

He released her breast so that he could lift her face to his again. He licked his tongue into her mouth, touching the palate right behind her top teeth, and she tightened her arms around him. She never wanted this to end, the sweet-hot scorch of his lips, the way her knees felt weak and her lips felt strong, the slow shift of his muscled shoulders under her hands. She had thought herself inured to the beauty of his body having seen it every morning for almost two months now, but the element of touch added a new layer of appreciation for the work of art he had sculpted himself into through hard work and determination.

His hand was back on her breast and she arched into his touch, pleading little whimpers falling from her lips. She rubbed against him, and his answering movements were getting more insistent. He could feel himself throbbing with his want for her. He continued to massage her thigh, feeling her muscles shifting with every rotation of her hips, slowly working his way up her leg until he felt the edge of her knickers. He slipped his fingertips under the silken fabric and it was if he had hit an off switch.

Halla’s eyes flew open and she pushed him away. She stared at him, panting, eyes wide and dark. “I can’t do this. I can’t be your whore.”

He grabbed her shoulders. “You aren’t a whore, Halla. Don’t ever say that.”

“If you’re paying me while you’re fucking me, that makes me a whore.”

“This isn’t just a fuck.”

“I don’t care what you call it. You can’t pay for my body. Please, listen to me Michael. I need this job. More than I need a lay, more than I need a boyfriend, more than I need you.” He could see the tears welling in her eyes as she hugged herself. “I have so many debts to repay, financial and otherwise, and I need to be able to do that to stay stable. I need that feeling like I’m not screwing up my life again. I like you, I really do, but I can’t, I  _can’t_  do this without hating myself. If you want to date me, you have to fire me, and I’m begging you please not to do that. But I’m also telling you, that if you kiss me again while you’re my boss, I’ll quit.”

She turned and ran back inside the suite, and he heard the door to her room slam shut. He punched the wall in frustration and then swore as the skin across his knuckles split. He sighed and went to go get some ice from the bar.

_You awake?_

**Yep. How’s Rotterdam?**

_Complicated. Would it be weird for me to call the front desk and ask them to send someone up to remove all the alcohol from the mini-fridge?_

**Not at all.**

_I’m three days away from my year mark. I am going to make it, if it’s the last thing I do._

**Are things going that bad? What can I do to help?**

_You’re in London, dearie._

**Hop, skip and a jump away. I can practically see you from here.**

_Those are some super powerful creeper binoculars you have then._

**Seriously, what can I do?**

_Just being there to talk to when I need you is enough._

**Are you sure?**

_Yes. Thank you. Really. Thanks._

**Any time. And I mean that. Any time you need me, I’ll be here.**

 

Fassy was nursing his sore knuckles with an icebag improvised from a bin liner when there was a knock at the door. “Housekeeping.”

He opened the door, confused about why they were coming by at two in the morning.

“You called the front desk and asked to have all the alcohol removed?”

“I didn’t,” he started, and then realized Halla must have called. “Right, come in.”

He stepped back and let the young gentleman come in carrying a box under his arm.

As Fassy sat and watched the young man quickly empty the mini-fridge, he realized how much stress he was subjecting Halla to that she felt she couldn’t even have alcohol in the suite, even after having been here a few days already. She had never asked for an accommodation from him before, and that he had pushed her this far made his frustration fade into guilt.

 

The next morning Halla pulled on her robe to go answer the call of room service at the door. When she had ordered waffles for breakfast, she had felt guilty for doing so knowing Fassy couldn’t have any. Now, though, she didn’t care.

She opened the door, still bleary-eyed and stood back so the man could bring in the cart.

“Where would you like this, ma’am?” She pointed at the table over by the windows as she scrubbed at her face with her other hand, still trying to wake up.

“You look cute all half-asleep and fuzzy like that.”

Her eyes flew open at the audacious comment. “Henry!”

He grinned. “I was wondering when you were going to wake up.”

“What are you doing here?” Her sleepy brain was still trying to process that he was actually standing in front of her.

“You sounded like you could use a friend.”

“But,” she blinked several times, “you were in London.”

“I told you; hop, skip and a jump.”

She flung herself at him and he wrapped his arms around her and held her tight. He could feel her shaking as he held her and realized she was silently crying. He pulled the cart further into the room with his foot so the door would swing shut and stroked her hair, not knowing what else to do.

A few minutes later, when she had almost calmed, but still had her face buried in his chest, Fassy wandered out of his bedroom. “Was that breakfast?” he asked as he stretched, his pyjamas slung low around his hips.

“Yes,” Henry said, “it is.”

Fassy stopped in mid-stretch and eyed the man holding Halla in a comforting embrace. “Cavill.”

“Fassbender.”

“I didn’t realize you were here. I don’t remember seeing any of your projects in the programme.”

“I’m not here for the festival.” He ran his hand down Halla’s back.

Fassy looked at the two of them for a moment and then nodded. “Right. Well, if we’re going to have company for breakfast, I’ll go put clothes on.”

He shut the bedroom door behind himself, grabbed his mobile off the nightstand and sank down on the edge of the bed. He pushed a single button and then waited as it rang.

“Why are you calling me at the arsecrack of dawn?”

“It’s after nine, it’s not the arsecrack of anything.”

The sound of someone moving around and groaning came through and then the voice said, “Right. Yes. What can I do for you this fine morning?”

“I fucked up, James.”

There was a sigh. “Did you make her cry?” Fassy didn’t say anything and James continued. “So, that is a yes, then. What did you do?”

“I kissed her.”

“Well no wonder she’s crying.”

“Listen ye gobshite, this is serious.”

“Right. Sorry. What do you want me to do?”

“Well, you know, fix it.”

James laughed for at least fifteen seconds as Fassy got progressively angrier.

“Go apologize and stop trying to kiss her.

“I’m not sorry for kissing her.”

“Well, lie then. I hear tell you’re an actor; you should be able to pull off a convincing apology.”

Fassy fell back on the bed. “That’s your advice. Lie to her. Tell me again how happy your marriage is.”

“Well, I take the precaution of not making her cry to begin with. It’s not my fault you’re as sharp as a beach ball.”

“Thanks, mate. Right helpful you’ve been.”

He rang off and dropped the phone on the bed and then stared at the ceiling for a few minutes as he planned how he was going to get Halla away from Henry long enough to apologize when she wouldn’t even look at him right now. His mind raced until he finally shoved himself up off the bed and pulled on a shirt. Whatever else he was going to do, it would start with him going back out there and not leaving her alone with Henry any more than was absolutely necessary.


	14. Chapter 14

Halla heard Michael’s bedroom door shut and slowly pulled back from Henry. “I think I fucked everything up.” She smoothed her hands over his shirt, trying to smooth the wrinkles her face had pressed into the white cotton.

He cupped her chin in his hand. “What can I do?”

 She sniffed and ran her hands under her eyes. “Tell me which of those two thingies has the waffles in it?”

“I’m still not sure how you manage to eat so much, little thing.” He lifted the covers on the trays and found Halla’s waffles. She picked up the tray. “Let’s go eat in my room.” She had been dreading an awkward breakfast with Michael this morning. Having Henry there would make it so much worse.

He followed her into her room where she plopped down cross legged on her bed and picked one of the strawberries off of her waffles and popped it in her mouth. “Have you eaten yet?”

“No. I’ll just get something later.”

She frowned. “Call room service and get something sent up.”

“I’ll be fine.”

She sighed in exasperation, her eyes narrowing as she glared at him. “You are twice my size, you need food, now call room service before I beat you about the head and shoulders with this piece of bacon.” She waved it at him menacingly.

She cut her waffle into pieces as he called room service. “Yes, eggs benedict, a fruit platter, and a pot of arabica coffee.”

She giggled. “Coffee snob,” she whispered loudly and he hushed her, a finger held against his lips. She was struck by a sudden urge to suck his finger into her mouth. Startled by the impulse, she counted the days in her head and realized she was in the horny as fuck stage of her cycle. Lovely.

Wondering how much of last night could be attributed to raging hormones and the fact that she hasn’t had sex since she stopped drinking, she looked at Henry, wondering if letting him hang out in her bedroom is really the best idea.

Henry sat down next to her and she handed him a piece of bacon.

“I’ll just wait until my food gets here.”

She shook her head. “No, you should eat this because then I won’t feel as bad when I eat some of your fruit platter.”

“You think you’re going to eat some of my fruit platter?”

She made her eyes huge and watery and let her bottom lip began to quiver. He took one look and threw up his hands in surrender. “Fine, I’ll eat your bacon.”

She giggled and went back to her waffles. Michael walked by her door and grabbed his tray off of the cart. A twinge of guilt shot through her stomach at not setting his breakfast for him, and he called to her as he went back the other way. “Halla, can we go through my schedule right now?”

“Sure,” she called. She mouthed the words, “I’ll be back,” to Henry and grabbed her planner off of the dresser. She plopped down in the chair opposite Michael at the small table and flipped open the calendar to the day’s date.

“Before we get to that, I need to say something.” She looked up from the page to see him regarding her, his face unaccustomedly serious. “I feel like I should apologize for kissing you last night, and for everything else that happened.  But I’m not sorry I kissed you. I am sorry for making you uncomfortable though, and you have my word I won’t kiss you again. Unless you ask me to.” A hint of his cheeky grin reappeared. “If you say you need this job more than you need us to be a couple, then I believe you and I’ll respect that, but just know that if you change your mind…” He trailed off. “If you change your mind, please let me know.”

“Thank you,” she said quietly. She looked back down at the schedule with a quiet sigh of relief that things had resolved themselves so easily. “Well, for today, you have a photo call at two, press screening at three and then the panel interview from five until six-thirty. And then you’re free for the evening after that.”

“Why don’t you take the day off? I can handle all that by myself.” He took a bite of egg white omelet.

“Really?”

“Yes. You’ve been working overtime for weeks now, and I’m thinking you didn’t get a lot of sleep last night.”

She ran her hand through her messy hair, trying to smooth it into some semblance of order. “Not really, no.”

He smiled at her, trying not to wonder what she was wearing under that fluffy white robe. “Go take a nap and then have a fun day exploring the city. There’s a film showing this morning that I want to see, and then I’ll come back and change for everything this afternoon. And I’ll see you when we both get back tonight. Does that sound agreeable?”

Halla felt a weight lift from her shoulders. It was like being Cinderella and the little animals had just shown up to help with her chores. “That sounds wonderful. Thank you so much, Michael.”

“And Halla, in the future, if you need help dealing with alcohol, please let me know. I would have cleaned out the fridge for you.”

She looked back down at her planner. “I didn’t want to impose on you. Especially not last night.”

He reached across the table and tipped her face up with a single finger under her chin. “Keeping you sober isn’t an imposition. If you’re struggling, I want to help.”

She managed a tired smile. “Thank you. I’ll remember that for the future.”

“Good. Now go finish your breakfast.”

Halla stood and smiled more enthusiastically. “I’m going to pull your outfit out for the photo call so I don’t forget, and then I’ll go eat.”

She headed into his bedroom and opened his closet. She’d steamed everything when they first got here so it was ready to go, she would just have to find where he had put the belt. She was on her hands and knees fishing it out from under the bed – how the hell did it get there? – when he stuck his head in the door. “I’m leaving now. I’ll be back to change, and I’ll see if I can find you some chocolate chip cookies while I’m out there.”

“If you do, can you please not toss them under my bed?” She grimaced as she finally grabbed the belt and yanked it back out.

He looked at the belt in her hand. “That’s not my belt.”

Halla looked at it and then squealed in disgust and dropped it. “Oh god, I’m gonna get cooties from that.”

She scrubbed her hand on her robe, trying to get the feel of the heavily grained leather off of her hand.

“Are you looking for this one?” He pulled up his tee and she sighed.

“Yes, that’s the one. Put it back on when you change, will you?”

He grinned, all thousand of his teeth on display. “Will do.”

“And put your shirt back down. I’m well acquainted with your sculpted abs, showoff.”

His smile didn’t fade as he let his shirt fall back down. “I’ll see you later, Sassy.”

He left the hotel room and as he waited for the lift, he wondered what he should do for the morning. He would have to pick up a copy of the festival programme and see what was showing. Surely he should be able to find something to keep him occupied while he proved to Halla that he wasn’t going to make things difficult for her.

Henry’s breakfast arrived right as she finished making sure Michael would have everything he needed and she stole a cluster of grapes from his plate as she plopped back down on the bed. She hopped back up. “I’m going to go wash my hands.”

She shed the robe that she’d wiped her hands on and then washed with plenty of soap. She sat back down on the bed.

“So, was that what upset you last night?”

“What?” Halla looked at the bunch of grapes in her hand and started pulling them from the vine one by one.

“Him kissing you.”

Halla didn’t say anything. How was she supposed to discuss this with Henry? He had caught a flight in the middle of the night for her and her heart told her that wasn’t normal friend behavior. She was almost positive that he had feelings for her, and she hadn’t managed to extinguish the emotions his kisses had kindled in her, even as many times as she told herself it was hopeless.

“Did he…did he push himself on you?”

Her head snapped up. “No!” She fell back on the bed, uninterested in her waffles now. “It wasn’t like that.”

“What happened?”

She let her head roll to the side so she could see him. “Do you think that you could not be a guy for a minute and just be my friend?”

His brow furrowed. “I’m not really sure how to stop being a guy, but I’ll try.”

“He kissed me last night. And,” she closed her eyes, “I kissed him back.”

Henry fought to keep his face expressionless. He had finally made the decision to ask her to date him, to help him figure out how to make her a part of his life. Their friend-dates had gone well, and he had discovered that he wanted to be with her more than he wanted to go out to clubs or to rugby matches. He had come here to tell her that and now this.

“Is he a bad kisser?” He stabbed the yolk of one of the eggs with his fork and watched as its yellow heart bled all over the food underneath.

“No!”

“Then what’s the problem?” He stabbed the other egg yolk.

A little stab of pain pierced her heart at how easily Henry was taking the news. “He’s my boss. I can’t date him while he’s my boss. And I need this job, so quitting isn’t really an option, either.”

Henry cleared his throat as he cut a wedge of cantaloupe into tiny little pieces. “Do you want to date him?”

“I don’t know. That sounds stupid, but he’s my boss, right? So I’ve pretty much squished any thoughts like that. There have been a few moments where there’s been a definite spark between us, but I’ve discouraged them. And honestly,” she sighed and crossed her arms over her face, hiding her eyes. “I’m not sure if it’s just a proximity issue. We’re around each other all the time, so it’s convenient. If I wasn’t his assistant, would he even notice me?”

“If he wasn’t your boss, and you two just met and he asked you out to dinner, would you go?”

“Yes?” She shrugged and sat back up and looked at him intently. “I mean, he’s nice and funny and sexy. Why wouldn’t I?”

Henry took a deep breath. “If you think he can make you happy, then maybe you should consider it. If you think he can be sensitive to your needs and take care of you, then it might be worth the risk. You don’t find matches like that every day.” His heart hurt as he said those words. He was half convinced she was his match, the one he would change for, but she didn’t want to hear that.  She didn’t want a declaration of feelings from him; she needed a friend. He’d blown his chance and she’d given up and moved on and now had another opportunity to be happy and he was going to be the supportive friend and help her get what she wanted.

Halla considered his advice while she ate her waffles. If there had ever been a time for Henry to say he wanted to be more than friends, that would have been it, and he encouraged her to pursue Michael. They really were going to be just friends and she needed to resign herself to that. She wasn’t convinced that she should take up Michael on his offer but at least Henry recusing himself from the pitch made her options clearer.

When they were done eating, she said, “I think I’m going to take a nap.”

Henry stood up. “Alright. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Would you mind…would you stay?” She didn’t want him to leave. Not yet.

“Stay?”

“I know you’re tired, you can take a nap too.”

Henry wanted to get out of there. It hurt to be around her right now. “I’m just down the hall in 812. I can sleep in my room.”

“I don’t want to be alone right now. And I’ll put pillows down the middle of the bed so you don’t have to worry about your virtue.” Her hopeful smile pulled a grin from him in response.

“Well, as long as you promise not to ravish me in my sleep, I guess I can stay.” He piled their empty dishes on the room service cart and put it out in the hall. When he came back she had pulled back the blankets and was stretched out in her t-shirt and a pair of pink boxers. He toed off his shoes and lay down on the other side of the bed. She pulled the blanket up under her chin and closed her eyes. Every minute or so she turned over, trying to find a comfortable position. She would sigh, rearrange her pillows, adjust the blanket, put her foot out, pull her foot back in, all to no end. Finally, Henry reached across the dividing line and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her against his chest. He placed her head on his chest and held her hand over his heart with one hand while he stroked her hair with the other. “Go to sleep, little one,” he whispered against her hair and she did.

“Halla!” Michael’s bellow jolted her from his sleep. He was standing in her bedroom doorway. “That photo call wasn’t at two. It was at noon.”

Halla scrambled from the bed and Henry’s arms. “It was at two! I swear, I wrote it down!”

“Well then you wrote it down wrong.” He stormed into his bedroom, yanking off his tee shirt and throwing it against the wall with a barely restrained fury.

She ran for the table where she had left her planner. No, she had written it down for two. She glanced at the clock. 1:10. Fuck.

“Luckily Dom called me wanting to know where I was so I was only fifteen minutes late. Of course I showed up in a faded tee and a pair of jeans, so I looked like a pretentious asshole who couldn’t give a shit about his own project.”

“I’m so sorry. It was a mistake.”

“Well I hope so. If you did this on purpose to pay be back for last night I would fire your ass.” She heard a hanger hit the wall.

She was flipping through the messages on her iPad relating to the film festival and found the one with the schedule for today. She sagged against the door frame of his bedroom. ‘Photocall for  _Frank – 12:00pm.’_ She’d fucked it up.

“What can I do to fix it?”

“Nothing. It’s too late now. But you’re getting dressed and you’re coming with me to the press showing and you are personally going to apologize to every single person who was there for the photo call for wasting their time and you’re lucky that I don’t make you personally apologize to the photographers for throwing off everyone’s schedule. And then you’re going to sit there and go through my schedule entry by entry and make sure you didn’t fuck anything else up.” He was buttoning his shirt and she was worried that he might actually yank them off in his anger.

She blinked several times and said, “Yes, sir.” She turned and headed back into her bedroom. He called out, “And get him out of my suite. I don’t want you entertaining your guests in here.”

Her steps faltered but she continued into her room where Henry was putting his shoes on. “I heard. I’m going. You know where I am if you need me.”

“Thank you for being my friend,” she said, wishing that she could turn the clock back fifteen minutes to when she had been slumbering safely in his arms.

He kissed her on the top of her head and left.

She followed Fassy quietly to the press screening where she apologized to the producers, director, and his co-stars about the error in his scheduling. She spent the next two hours sitting outside the film going through her calendar an entry at a time and checking it against the emails she had saved in her iPad. There were no other errors.

When he came out of the screening, he told her to go get him coffee and then told the rest of the cast that she was going to get coffee and did they want anything? “You’ll probably want to write these down, though even that might not help.” Thirty minutes later she was back just before the panel interview started and walked behind the table distributing everyone’s orders. “Did you write all the orders down correctly, Halla?” he asked.

“Yes, Mr. Fassbender, I believe I did.” Her politely snarky answer was met with a placid smile which she wanted to respond to by accidentally dumping his coffee in his lap, but even she wasn’t that idiotic.

The interview was boring.  _Frank_  was one of those weird indie movies she never would have watched on her own, and listening to people ask uninspired questions about something she wasn’t interested in was like watching grass grow. After it was over, Mr. Fassbender decided that they should all go have dinner together, and she was swept along with them with no choice in the matter. She managed to get seated at the end of the table away from him and quietly ate her sous vide rabbit loin and wild mushroom risotto.

Dom finally asked her why she was being monastically withdrawn. “You’re not still thinking about the messup with the photo-call are you?”

“Yes. Mr. Fassbender’s pissed. I’ve never seen him so upset.”

Dom shrugged. “He’ll get over it.”

“I don’t know. It’s been a hard week.”

He patted her lightly on the arm. “Film festivals are always stressful. Don’t let him get to you. He’ll forget about it in a few days.”

“In case he doesn’t, do you know anyone looking for a personal assistant?”

Dom laughed quietly. “I’d snap you up myself, but I couldn’t afford you.”

She rolled her eyes at the idea that she was worth that much. “If he fires me, I think my asking price might come down considerably.”

“Well, you let me know if he does.”

She touched his arm, “Tell me about your next projects. Your Tony nomination must have thrown you into the path of some interesting options.”

The two of them discussed his upcoming movies for the rest of the meal and after as their plates were cleared. The waiter asked if she wanted something for dessert.

“I don’t suppose you have chocolate chip cookies and a glass of milk, do you?” She noticed Fassy look at her from his end of the table as her words carried.

“Not quite, but we have a dark chocolate studded shortbread which we can serve hot with Madagascar vanilla ice cream and salted caramel sauce.”

She turned to Dom. “Want to share?”

“Absolutely.”

Everyone else ordered desserts as well and she continued to talk to Dom as they ate, spoon fencing over who got the last bite of the ice cream. “That’s like an orgasm with my mouth,” she said, as she set her long-handled spoon down on the empty plate.

“Darling,” Dom leaned over and whispered in her ear, “that was good, but if that’s what your orgasms are like, you’re doing it wrong.”

Halla blushed bright pink and laughed loud enough to draw attention from the other people at the table, causing her to blush even harder. She turned to Dom, “And I suppose you know how to do it right?”

If Henry was a puppy dog and Michael was a shark, Dom was one of those mysterious Japanese monkeys sitting in a steaming pool in the snow, with a self-deprecating grin that made you want to ask him what he knew that you didn’t. “I’m better than dessert.”

She patted his arm. “Well, I’ll keep that in mind if I ever decide I want lessons.”

Fassy then decided that everyone should go out to one of the parties that marked every night of the festival. Halla tried to beg off, but Maggie Gyllenhaal begged her not to leave and make her be the only girl left in the group, so hand in hand with Maggie they went to a generic looking celebrity party being sponsored by she wasn’t sure who. The music was loud and the lights were flashing and Maggie and Dom dragged her out onto the dance floor before she could protest. It was wild and crazy and she danced with everybody on the cast and crew except Fassy. Every time he got close to her, she grabbed someone else to dance with. She was on her fourth bottle of water when she realized how much she needed to pee. She was on her way back from the lady’s room when Fassy grabbed her arm in the dimly lit hallway.

“We need to talk.”

“I can’t think about what, Mr. Fassbender.” Her smile was bright and hard as the paint on an expensive sports car.

“You know about what.”

“Me fucking up your schedule? I’ve double checked your next three months of appointments and they are free of errors, Mr. Fassbender.”

He hissed in her ear, his fingers starting to dig painfully into her arm. “Is this really what you want? You call me Mr. Fassbender and I make you get coffee for everybody?”

She turned to face him, her mouth a bare inch from his. “I don’t know what other choice I have right now. I understand you being mad that I messed up your schedule and made you look bad. But embarrassing me in front of your co-workers is just cruel, and whatever else I may think about you, I had never considered you cruel before.”

She could see the words hit home, his eyes softening and his fingers relaxing around her arm. “And what do you call what you’re doing? I tell you I care for you, and then you make sure I see you in bed with Henry and now you’ve spent the evening flirting with Dom. I can’t have you but you’ll make sure I see everyone else you’re handing it out to?”

Her hand flew of its own volition and the crack of her palm hitting his cheek was startling loud. “Fuck you. Consider that my letter of resignation.”

His head had snapped to the side under the blow, and he slowly brought it back round to face her. “I’ll take that under advisement. You will work out the rest of this festival and I’ll let you take back your decision if you want.”

“I can’t wait to get back to London.” She yanked her arm free from him and stalked out.

She knocked on Henry’s hotel room door and waited. He didn’t answer. She knocked louder, praying he was there. He opened the door and looked surprised to see her. “Halla, what are you doing here?”

“Can I stay here tonight? I don’t think I can be around him anymore.”

“Ummm, I don’t think that’s a good idea, Halla.”

She backed up a little in surprise at him turning her down and then she really looked at him, the messy hair, swollen lips, shirtless with his jeans unbuttoned, the way he had stepped out into the hall and mostly closed the door behind him.

“Right. Of course.” She turned around and headed for the lift.

He came after her. “Halla, I had a couple drinks and I don’t want that to affect you.”

“And you don’t want me to affect the woman you have in your room.” She punched the down button.

He had the good sense not to deny it. “Why are you jealous? We’re just friends, Halla.”

“I know, right? I was the one who refused to let anything happen, so why should I be upset now? I don’t have a claim on your dick. Go have a fun time. Maybe I’ll see you tomorrow.” She watched the numbers over the elevator doors slowly increase.

“Are you upset at me being with someone else?”

The doors opened and she stepped into the empty elevator. He grabbed her by the arm to keep her from going.

“You know, I’m really tired of men thinking they can manhandle me tonight. Please let me go before I end up slapping you too.”

He dropped his hand in shock. “You slapped Fassbender?”

She pushed the close door button.

“Halla, please talk to me.”

“Go enjoy your friend.”

The doors slid closed and she slumped against the wall. She pushed the button for the lobby. She had no idea where she was going, but she wasn’t going to stay on the eighth floor of this hotel.

***

Halla stood in front of the group. Even in a different country, an AA meeting was a familiar constant. In the activity room of an old church, she faced a group of familiar strangers on folding chairs as the early morning light sleepily worked its way through the dirty windows. The acrid tang of burnt coffee hung in the air. She tugged up the neckline of her shirt, making sure it covered the bite mark shaped bruise that throbbed on the swell of her breast. “My name is Halla, and I’m an alcoholic.” The response sounded the same, even on differently accented tongues. She closed her eyes as the tears began to drip down her cheeks. “It’s been four hours since I had my last drink.”


	15. Chapter 15

Michael stumbled out of bed at the second set of knocks at the door. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes as he plodded to the main door to the suite. He looked through the hole and wondered why in the hell Halla hadn’t gotten up to let in room service. He was opening the door as the memories of last night flashed through his head, the sting of her hand on his cheek returning full-force. He pointed at the table when the man asked him where he wanted breakfast set up, signed the receipt and then shut the door behind him.

He eyed Halla’s closed door warily; after last night’s disaster he hadn’t seen her. He knocked on her door. She didn’t answer. Another louder knock also didn’t elicit a response. He tried the handle and it turned easily under his hand. The room was dark except for the light coming in from behind him. The bed hadn’t been slept in, but a trail of clothes led to the bathroom. He could hear the water running and a glimmer of light escaping from under the closed door illuminated ghostly wisps of steam.

Michael knocked on the bathroom door and called her name. She didn’t answer. He called it again, a little louder. Their day was scheduled straight through from 10:00am to the premiere that evening and they both needed to get moving if they were going to get everything done on schedule. When she didn’t answer, he cracked the door and called her name again into the billowing cloud of steam that swirled out, instantly coating him in a thin sheen of moisture. For a third time, there was no response.

“Halla, are you okay?” He waited for an answer and when none came, he stepped into the bathroom. The steam was dissipating somewhat and through the swirling clouds and the condensation dripping down the glass walls of the shower, he saw her sitting on the tiled floor of the glassed in shower, her head in her hands. Her entire body was bright pink but where the water was hitting her it shaded to a painful crimson red.

“Halla!” He threw open the shower door and slapped off the water, wincing as the scalding liquid splashed him.

She looked up blinking and even with her staring at him blearily, he wasn’t positive she actually saw him. Her eyes were bloodshot and she was shivering as if she were cold, though the sweat dripping between his shoulder blades and down his spine testified that it was impossible for anyone to be cold in this improvised sauna.

“Come on; let’s get you out of there.” He grabbed a towel and bent down to wrap it around her but she backed away from him.

“I need to stay in here. I need to get it all out.” She was staring at him but he still felt that she wasn’t seeing him.

“It’s all out,” he said. He had no idea what she was talking about, but her lobster impersonation wasn’t going to help anything. He reached out to her again but she slapped frantically at his hands, batting them away.

“No. It’s still there. I can’t ever get it out. I try but I can’t.”

He squatted beside her on the slick tile and held his hands out in front of him. “It’s all out, Halla. I promise, baby. Okay?”

Her eyes closed and her head sank down on her knees again. He draped the towel over her back and her entire body jerked as the terry weave brushed against the scalded skin. He carefully picked her up, one arm under her knees, another around her back. She slumped limply against his chest. He easily carried her out of the bathroom; he had always known she was small, but she felt skeletal in his arms. He hugged her against his chest as he pulled down the blanket far enough that he could place her on the crisp white sheet. The bite mark on her breast drew his immediate attention. He couldn’t tell how recent it was, and he quickly scanned her body looking for anything else that might be worrisome. There was nothing and he whispered, “Halla, baby? Can you roll over on your stomach? I think you might feel better with nothing against your back.”

She lay unmoving and he gently rolled her over onto her stomach and then pulled the sheet up to her waist, letting the throbbing red skin cool. He went back in the bathroom and turned on the vent and then turned up the air conditioning. He wasn’t sure if ice was good or bad for a burn; hadn’t the recommendations changed? He found Halla’s mobile in her purse and flipped through her contacts until he found Henry and called him. While he was waiting for an answer he grabbed his iPad and started looking up treatments for a first degree burn.

His call was answered. “Halla, where have you been?”

“This is Michael, not Halla.”

There was a short pause. “Is she alright?”

“No. She’s not. Was she with you last night?” Part of him hoped that he was the one who had left her like this just to get him out of her life; a better part of him never wanted her to be hurt by a friend like that.

“I saw her for a few minutes but that’s it. What’s wrong?”

“I’m not really sure.” He scrubbed the palm of his hand against his suddenly aching head. “Would you mind coming over to my room? I know we have our issues, but I think it’s going to take both of us to get her through the next few days.”

“I’ll be right there.”

A minute later there was a knock at the door. Henry stood there, stubbled and barefoot, in a pair of jeans and a hastily donned tee. “Where is she?”

“She’s in her room.”

Henry brushed past Michael and went into Halla’s room. Michael heard a whispered, “Damn,” as Henry saw her. He leaned against the wall for a few seconds, trying to organize the whirlwind of thoughts ripping through his brain into some semblance of order. He went into Halla’s room and found Henry kneeling at her bedside, holding her hand.

“You found her like this?” Henry’s eyes were fixed on Halla’s face with its puffy eyes and cracked parted lips. Her pale hair stood out in stark contrast against the scarlet skin. It was wet and lank around her face, much like when he had first met her, but that is where the resemblance ended.

“No, I found her in the shower. I don’t know how long she had been in there, but she had the water turned as hot as it would go, and when I tried to get her out, she said, ‘I have to get it out.’

“It?”

He scratched at his scalp, trying to get rid of the thoughts tormenting him. “I don’t know for sure, but my guess is she relapsed last night.”

“Fuck.”

“My thoughts exactly.” He rubbed awkwardly at his beard. “This is awkward as shite but is the bite mark on her breast from you?”

Henry looked at Michael for the first time. “No. We haven’t even kissed in almost two months.”

“What? You two were in bed together yesterday.”

“She asked me to stay with her while she slept.” He shook his head as he remembered her begging him to stay. Had he been that blind to what she was really asking? “She’s been having a really hard time lately.” That was blindingly obvious in retrospect.

“So you two aren’t…” He didn’t know the right word. Dating? Fucking? In love?

He shook his head as he reached out and touched her hand. She didn’t respond to his touch. The faint rise and fall of her back was the only sign that she was alive. “No. I thought maybe we could try again, that’s part of the reason I chartered a plane and came over yesterday. I realized how stupid I was being letting her alcoholism be an issue for us, but then she told me you asked her out and I thought she had moved on so I didn’t say anything.”

He slumped against the wall and let his head fall back. “And then I was a total and complete shit to her because I thought she was jerking me around.”

“Did she slap you?”

He raised his head to look at Henry. “She told you?”

“She came by last night and got pissed at me and I grabbed her by the arm to keep her from leaving and she told me to stop manhandling her or she would slap me too.”

“I accused her of whoring around to rub it in my face that I couldn’t have her.”

Henry shot off the bed. “You said what?”

Michael tensed as he came off the wall, his weight balanced on the balls of his feet. “And where were you when she came to you for help last night?”

Henry slowly sank back down on the edge of the bed. “I was drinking and with another woman.”

“Well, we officially suck at being friends.”

Henry looked over at Halla. “You think this is our fault?”

“We both knew she was struggling; I treated her like shite and you…well, y’know, I’m not going to label what you did.”

Henry  pulled at the neck of his tee, his head cocking to the side as he tried to keep from losing his temper.“Halla and I are just friends. I’m not allowed to have sex with another woman when she’s having a bad day?”

Michael crossed the room in a few steps and grabbed him by the front of his shirt and yanked him to his feet. “Did you think that maybe she isn’t interested in being just your friend?” Henry shoved Michael back but Michael stepped back in, inches from Henry’s face but not touching him. Michael’s voice was a deep rumble as he fixed his menacing glare on the larger man. “That she keeps calling you hoping that you would get it through your head that you are capable of being with her even with her being an alcoholic? She talks about you all the damn time. Henry and I did this, Henry and I are going to do that, Henry said this really funny thing, and it’s never funny, but she thinks you are funny, and finding a woman who thinks you are funny is a gift. So pull your head out of your arse,” he slapped Henry hard on the back of his head, “you daft prick, and realize what you are fucking up.”

Michael turned on his heel and left Halla’s room, his jaw working furiously as he swore at himself for giving any helpful advice to Henry. He had been sure they were sleeping together after seeing them in bed that morning, and it made the accusation that he had flung at Halla even more abhorrent. No wonder she had slapped him. He had deserved it; that and much more besides. It was one small way of righting the wrong he had done her.

He took a cold shower, the feel of hot water abhorrent as it just made him think of Halla’s pain. He got dressed in the clothes she had selected for this interview, a dark button down over faded jeans and a v-neck jumper that she insisted on calling rust but looked brown to him. She swore it would bring out the ginger in his hair, but he was almost positive she purchased it because she couldn’t stop petting the cashmere.

He pulled on his shoes and went back into Halla’s room. Henry was sitting next to her on the bed, gently stroking her hair with just the fingertips of one hand, his head resting against the headboard, eyes closed. Michael crossed to where she was and sat down on the edge of the bed. “Halla, can you wake up for a minute?”

She slowly turned her face in his direction and her eyes creaked open.

“I have to go do interviews. Henry’s going to stay with you for a while, though.”

“You’re wearing it wrong,” she whispered.

“What?”

“Shove up the sleeves, and then fold back the cuffs of the shirt over the bottom of the jumper sleeves.” Her voice cracked from the effort of speaking. “And there’s a knotted leather bracelet that goes with that outfit.” She put her hands flat against the bed and began to push herself up, but both men grabbed her hands.

Michael gently stroked his fingers against hers. “You stay here, I’ll get the bracelet.”

She let herself back down on the pillows. “I’m so sorry.” A single tear escaped and rested against the bridge of her nose.

“You don’t have to apologize. You sleep; everything is under control. Henry’s here for a while to keep an eye on you and if you need, hell, if you  _want_ anything, call the front desk and have them get it for you.” He went to touch her face but stopped, feeling constrained from showing her any affection with Henry sitting there watching. “And if you need me, I’m a text away.”

She blinked in acknowledgement and then let her eyes fall shut. He left the room without saying anything to Henry. He wasn’t sure what they would have to say to each other at this point.

Henry heard the door close behind Michael. He started stroking her hair again, feeling the damp strands slip between his fingers. “I love you, Halla,” he whispered to her sleeping form.

“You don’t love me,” she murmured. “You just want someplace to keep your dick warm.”

Henry bit back a curse. “I am in love with you.”

She slowly rolled over onto her side so she was facing him. Her bright eyes were watering as she focused on his face. “If you were in love with me, your reaction to me saying that my boss hit on me and I’m confused about it would not be fucking another woman.”

 He brushed a finger against the mark on her breast. “And who is this bite mark from? It’s not mine.”

She yanked the sheet up to her chin. Her face contracted in pain before her eyes shut. “It’s from a mistake.”

“So you can make mistakes and I can’t?”

She rolled away from him, the white sheet stark against her red back that she turned to him. “But you don’t think yours was a mistake, do you? You just gave up on me. I gave up on myself; that’s always a mistake.”

“Why are you so mad at me for this? We weren’t even dating, much less exclusive.”

She looked over her shoulder at him, lines of pain creasing her face as the motion pulled at her shoulders and back. “Because part of me wants to be able to blame this on someone other than myself.”

“I love you, Halla. I’m in love with you. Give me the chance and I’ll prove it. I just need to know that you want me the same way.” He combed his fingers through her hair, something he had done so many times before.

“I don’t know anything right now. I’m starting all over. Asking me to love you would be like asking an infant to enroll in university.”

He stretched out behind her on the bed. “Then what am I supposed to do?” He placed one hand on her hip, his fingers carefully wrapping around the curve of her body. She seemed smaller than the last time he had touched her like this.

She closed her eyes in defeat. “Don’t ask me. If I have to tell you what to do, it doesn’t mean anything. I can’t even run my own life much less yours.”

She fell asleep moments after that, and he watched her breathing. She slept unmoving for hours, the sleep of someone who has no reason to wake up and the longer he watched her sleep, the more he wondered how he could help her never end up like this again. There had to be something he could do.


	16. Chapter 16

Halla felt the mattress shift under someone’s weight and opened her eyes.

“Hello, poppet.”

Her lips curved in an attempt at a smile. “Hello, James.”

“I’m just going to put a cold compress on your back and then I’ll let you sleep some more.”

“No lecture?”

“I think you’ve said everything to yourself I would think of and more.” He handed her a few paracetamol tablets and a glass of water. “Besides, this will make you feel better than a lecture.”

She sat up enough to swallow the pills without dribbling water down her chin and handed the cup back to James. She slumped back down on the pillow.

Halla looked up at James’s friendly face. “Henry told me he loved me.”

“Well, good,” James said cheerfully.

“And Michael kissed me.”

“You’ve had an exciting few days.”

“And I kissed him back.”

“You’ve been very busy.”

“I also slapped him.”

“He probably deserved it.”

“You’re not going to give me advice, are you?”

“Absolutely not, lassie.”

“I quit my job.”

“I’ll miss you.”

“I got drunk.”

“I had assumed as much.”

“I made out with a boy.”

“Besides one of the two you’ve already named?”

“Yes.”

James stood up, pulled a chair over to the side of the bed, sat down and said, “Okay, spill.”

She told him everything, from Michael’s heartfelt speech on the balcony to Henry coming to her rescue, to messing up the schedule, the fight between her and Michael, finding Henry with another woman and then going down to the lobby.

“And then I bumped into someone…” she looked at James hesitantly, “someone you know, and he wanted to know why I looked so sad and we started talking and I felt hopeless. No job, no friends, no hope, and I had a drink because it didn’t matter anymore. And it tasted so good and I had another, and then…” She shrugged. “We were dancing and then we were grinding and then I went back to his hotel room with him.”

She closed her eyes for a while as she thought about all that had happened in that hotel room. “I thought it would feel so good to just let something physical happen without all the complications of emotion being involved. But it didn’t feel good. I felt really shitty, partly because I knew I was being a coward because I had men who cared for me as more than just a film festival fuck but mostly because I knew if I hadn’t been drunk I would never have done what I was doing. And also because he was…rougher…than I like.”

James’s brows furrowed into a vee. “Did he hurt you?”

She pulled down the sheet enough for the bite mark to appear, livid purple and maroon marks clearly delineating each tooth.

He hissed in a breath across closed teeth. “Do you want me to beat him up for you? Maybe not by myself but I think I know of two rather large gents who would be more than happy to help me punch a bloke in the face. Or other parts.”

Her attempt at a smile was the most successful one so far that day. “No, I don’t think that will be necessary. Though if I ever need to come up with an activity to make Henry and Michael cooperate, I’ll keep that in mind.”

James sat quietly for a while as she drifted in and out of sleep. “If you don’t mind me saying something?”

She turned her head to look at him, unused to the tentative tone. “Go ahead.”

“You call him Michael now.”

She smiled guiltily. “Kissing him changed things.”

James leaned forward and took her hand in between his. “I don’t know if this matters to you at all, but he really does like you. He chatters about you non-stop when you’re not around. I’ve never seen him go arse over teakettle like this before.”

Halla wanted to stick her fingers in her ears and yell, ‘La La La, I can’t hear you!’ She could barely handle her own emotions right now; she didn’t want to be responsible for anyone else’s. “I don’t think that helps right now. Maybe it will when I stop hating myself. Right now I don’t want to think about either of them; I just want to sleep.”

“Okay, poppet. On your stomach and I’ll put this compress on your back and you go back to sleep.”

“Tell him I’m sorry I’m missing the premiere, please.”

“I will. You sleep. And just for the record, I count you as a friend. No matter what happens with Michael and the kissing and slapping and quitting, you still have me. I’m sort of like a fungus when it comes to friends.”

She woke again when the lamp on the table was turned on. It provided the only illumination in the room besides the lights from the nightly activities of the city that filtered through the sheer curtains covering the windows. Michael was undoing his tie and watching her. He had already shed his suit coat.

“Are you the next in my line of nannies today?”

He grinned at her. “I think I should be the last one for the day.” He walked over to the side of the bed. “How are you feeling?”

She groaned. “I’m not sure I could sleep anymore for a while. My back hurts. I’m still disgusted with myself.”

“You want some more paracetamol?”

“That would be nice.”

He tapped out a few more tablets from the bottle James had left on the nightstand and handed them to her along with her cup of water.

She took them and laid down on her side. “Can you come down here so I can see you easier?” Her hand patted the sheet.

“Of course.” He lay down on the bed facing her, his head on the pillow next to hers. “Is that comfortable for you?”

She blinked in acknowledgement, the emaciated remnants of a smile on her face. “Did the premiere go well? Did everybody love you?”

He undid the first few buttons on his shirt. “Well, no one jumped in their seat or screamed out loud, but the applause sounded genuine. And there wasn’t any popcorn.”

“I’m sorry I missed it. I fucked everything up, Michael.” Her voice was clouded with tears.

He brushed her hair back from her forehead. “We’ll get it all sorted.”

She shook her head, her eyes closed in hopelessness. “It’s all fucked up. I missed your movie and I screwed up your schedule and I drank, Michael. I had a drink. I was so close to a year and I fucking drank.”

He stroked his thumb across the lines creasing her forehead. “How much did you have?”

“Three martinis. With onions. I really miss martini onions.”

“And then you stopped, right?”

She nodded.

“You wouldn’t have done that before.”

She opened her eyes in surprise. He sounded proud of her. “Well no, but I drank.”

He gently stroked her cheek, wanting to comfort her and to let her body give her something besides pain. “You slipped, baby. Everyone makes mistakes, but you caught yourself fast.”

She closed her eyes, exhausted from the short conversation, from the pain of her own skin, from the thought of starting over again.

“Have you eaten anything today?”

She shook her head slightly.

“You need to eat. There’s not enough of you to let you skip meals.”

“I’m not hungry, though.”

“How about a milkshake? I bet the cold would feel nice.”

She thought for a while. The chilly beverage did sound appetizing. “Okay,” she whispered.

He tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. “I’ll be right back.”

He came back into her bedroom a few minutes later to find her coming out of the bathroom, the sheet from the bed clutched to her chest. “I tried to brush my hair but it hurts too much.”

“As badly as you burned your shoulders and back, I think everything’s going to hurt for a few days, baby.”

She held out the hairbrush to him with a sad look on her face.

He took it from her with an amused smile. “Turn around.” She did, the sheet twirling around her legs. He carefully brushed out her long hair, keeping his hand under all of it so it wouldn’t brush against her inflamed skin. He tried to keep his eyes off the knickers she had donned while he was out of the room, but the skimpy cherry-dotted white cotton trimmed in red that his single glance had revealed struck him as funny.

Her hair started to shine under the long strokes of the brush. “Do you want me to try and tie it up or something? So it’s not on your back?”

“There’s a tie around the handle of the brush.”

He pulled the elastic off and, with his tongue between his teeth, put it around her hair, and then twisted and through again, and then once more and he pulled her hair part way through so it would stay up.  He smoothed his hand over her lumpy bumpy hair. “Not nearly as pretty as when you do it, but it should work.”

She trudged over to the bed, fighting the sheet that bound her legs, and carefully sat down on it. “Next time when I think about drinking, I’ll remember how miserable I feel right now and hopefully it will help.”

Michael paused, unsure if he was interpreting what she had just said correctly. “Are you saying that you hurt yourself on purpose to keep you from drinking again?”

“No. But I don’t make good choices when I’m drinking. Obviously.” She rubbed her hand over her chest, where the bite mark was covered by the sheet.

“Do you want to talk about what happened?”

“I had a bad day and I made bad choices?” Her laugh was humorless. “I don’t know how to talk about it without it sounding like I’m blaming you and Henry, and I’m not. I’m responsible for my drinking, no one else.”

“We didn’t help, though.”

“Well, you work on being less of a fuckweed, and I’ll work on being less of an alcoholic,” she replied, with a glimmer of her old sass.

His laughter made her smile. “Deal.” He walked over to the table where he had left his tie. “I stopped by a market and got this.” He held up a blue bottle. “Aloe vera gel, and this,” a white canister with a blue lid, “is a topical anesthetic. Feel like trying either?”

“Aloe vera. That’s what my mom always used on me when I got a sunburn.”

He put down the can and picked up a box. He handed it to her as there was a knock on the door. He came back with a giant chocolate milkshake and found her eating a chocolate chip cookie. “These are really good.”

He handed her the milkshake and then picked up the remote for the telly. “Scoot forward and find something to watch.”

He climbed behind her on the bed, his legs extending out on either side of her. She drank her milkshake and ate cookies while flipping through the channels until she settled on watching the original series of  _Star Trek._ He carefully rubbed the aloe vera gel across her shoulders and down her back. He concentrated on Kirk and Spock rescuing the Enterprise instead of thinking about Halla sitting between his legs wearing nothing but a pair of knickers. He forced himself not to think about the feel of her skin under his hands other than to think about how much pain she was in. She seemed completely oblivious to the effect she could have easily had on him with almost no effort on her part.

When he finished treating her back she handed him a cookie. She stretched out on her stomach and pulled the sheet around her so it was covering her rear. He laid down next to her, and with their elbows hooked over pillows they ate cookies and watched Dutch sit-coms and made up their own dialogue. He noticed when her head started drooping and helped her get tucked back into bed. He sat in the chair James had left by her bed and watched telly with her as she fought sleep. Her eyes closed like blinds controlled by an unskilled hand, and finally, she slept.

She woke in the morning to Michael whispering her name. She propped herself up on one elbow in the muted darkness and blew the loose tendrils of hair out of her face. He was squatting at the edge of her bed, his hand cupped around something he was holding that glowed, the light softening the angles of his face. He removed his hand and showed a cupcake with a single lit candle poked into the pink icing. “Happy one day sober, Halla.”

The candlelight flickered in the tears in her eyes as she stared at the cupcake he held cupped in his palm.  “I know you wanted to celebrate a different anniversary today, but we’re going to celebrate every day you stay sober. One day at a time. One cupcake at a time if you need it.”

She closed her eyes and made a wish and then leaned forward and blew out the candle. She wrapped her hand around the back of his head, pulled him to her and kissed him.


	17. Chapter 17

Michael was surprised at her kiss. Her lips lingered for a moment and then she pulled back. “Thank you. This is so sweet of you.”

He smiled, still focused on how her lips had felt. “I’m serious. Whatever you need to deal with this, I’m willing to help.”

“Thank you.” She threw up her hands in helplessness. “That sounds so insignificant compared to what I mean, but thank you.” She blinked back the tears and then rubbed her hands across her face. “I think today is going to be a thinking day for me. I have a lot of decisions I need to start making if I’m going to start over with any success.”

“Alright.” He stood back up and put the cupcake on her nightstand. “Let me know if you need anything.”

“I will.” He brushed his hand over her hair and left.

About forty-five minutes later, she made her way out of her bedroom wearing skinny jeans and a loose tunic. Her hair was straight down her back and she wasn’t wearing any make up. “I’m going to go out for a walk; clear my head a bit. You don’t have any events today so you shouldn’t need me.”

He looked up from his breakfast at her standing there, her personality a mere shadow of what it had been two days ago. “Of course. You go.”

She gave him a shaky smile and slipped out the door into the hallway.

As she was waiting for the lift, Henry caught up to her. “I was just coming to see you.”

“I was going for a walk.”

“Mind if I tag along?”

She rubbed her thumb nervously against her fingernails. “Actually, I kind of want to be alone.”

“Oh.” He rocked back on his heels.

“Henry, I need some time to think about things. A lot has occurred over the past few days and I need some time to process.”

“Well, right. Of course.” He put his hands in his pockets. “How much time do you need?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. I’ll call you, alright?”

“Sure.”

She stepped into the lift and pushed the close door button.

***

Halla looked around at the three men sitting in the living area of her suite. “Welcome to my one and a half day sober party.” She finished pouring the sparkling apple juice into the glasses. “I know it’s nothing fancy,” she looked at the pizzas sitting on the coffee table they were gathered around, “but I’ve done a lot of thinking today about what I’m going to do now, and I’ve made some decisions, and I thought I would call you three together and tell you all at once since they’re going to affect all of you the most. Besides myself, of course.”

She took a sip of the juice to wet her suddenly dry mouth and then put the glass down. “Eat. Get some pizza before I get to the serious stuff.”

They all got a slice and started eating and chatted politely about inconsequential things. Halla managed to get down four bites before her nerves overtook her and she blurted out. “I’m not going back to London.” Michael and Henry put down their plates as they looked at her in surprise. James sat back with a smile and continued to eat his portabella and spinach pizza.

“Well, I am,” she corrected herself and then hurried on, “but just long enough to pack my flat and move my boxes into my parents’ house. And then I’ll pack me a little suitcase and I’m off to Hungary.”

“Hungary?” Henry asked in surprise. “Why there?”

“Well, I got a job. Nothing super impressive, but I’m going to be a costume tech on a mini-series that is filming there. I ran into Chelsea,” she looked at Michael, “the other assistant from that day you got me fired, while I was out on my walk. She came here with Jenny as her assistant but it’s her last thing before she heads to Hungary and she knew that one of the other assistants had just quit due to some medical issues and called the head costuming person – I really need to learn the real titles of all these people – and apparently the costumer had had her own run-ins with Jenny and was impressed that I had the courage to stand up to her, and hired me. Pre-production starts next week. So I’m leaving tonight to go back home and pack and then I’m gone.”

She looked around at her audience nervously. “It’s not a fancy job, and the pay isn’t nearly as good as what I’m earning here, but it’s my job and I’m going to do it and do it well, and take the time to figure out my next steps.”

“That’s wonderful, Halla,” Michael said.

“How long will you be gone?” Henry asked.

“Depending on how the weather cooperates, four and a half or five months.”

Henry sat back in his chair. “That’s quite a while.”

“It is. And that’s why I brought both of you here. You both know about each other, and I’m just going to get this out all at once. I like both of you. Honestly, I do. And I care for both of you, but I’m not in a good place right now to be in a relationship with anyone. I don’t know what I’m doing with my own life and there’s no way I can be in a good relationship right now because I don’t know what I want. I feel like I’m different people when I’m with you two, and I don’t know who I am. I met you both when my life was in turmoil, and I want to feel like I know who I am and what I want as a person before I try and figure out what I want from a partner.”

She’d rehearsed that speech for the last two hours, and she stumbled over the last few words and now that the words were hanging in the air she found she couldn’t meet anyone’s eyes.

“That’s really smart of you,” Michael said.

“You really think so?”

“I do. And I’m proud of you. You put this all together yourself and you’re going to make it happen on your own. I think you’re stronger than you know.” He patted her on the knee.

Halla sniffed back the tears that were fighting to emerge. “No making me cry, bastard.”

She stood up and so did all the men. James raised his glass. “To Halla and her new adventures.”

The others picked up their glasses and they all toasted.

“Okay, I’m going to hug all you and then go finish packing before I cry. Watch the burn.”

She hugged Michael tightly. “I’ll call you when I get back,” she murmured against his chest as he rested his hands on her hips.

He kissed her on top of her head. “Give ‘em hell, Sassy.”

She hugged Henry, resting her head against his shoulder like she had so many times, his heartbeat a familiar soothing rhythm like waves breaking against the shore. She didn’t want to let go of her rock and she started crying as she held him. He tucked her head under his chin as she started to sob. She knew as she held him that this would have been her future if she hadn’t been an alcoholic. But she was, and she didn’t know if she could ever be strong enough to let her live a life that wouldn’t make him resent her.

“Goodbye, Superman.”

He brushed his fingers against her cheek. “I’ll miss you, Barbie.”

She turned to James and broke down, sobbing so hard she could barely breathe, her face red and her nose stuffing up. She covered her face with her hands, not wanting anyone to see her ugly crying. “C’mon poppet.” He carefully led her into her bedroom and shut the door behind them. She threw herself face first on the bed and cried until there was nothing left in her heart. James quietly sat next to her.

“It hurts so much to leave and start over again,” she said into the emotional void and quiet that followed.

“I know, darlin.”

She rolled over onto her side and looked at James. “Keep an eye on Fassy for me. Don’t let him wear orange trousers.”

“I won’t.”

“And if I need someone to talk to when things get bad, can I still call you, please?” Her eyes pleaded with him even though her voice sounded devoid of emotion.

“Of course. We’re friends. I’ll always be here for you, Halla.”

“I guess I should finish packing. Will you make sure they’re not out there when I leave? I don’t want to start crying again.”

“Right.”

They both stood and she hugged him one more time. “Thank you for putting in the reference for me. I wouldn’t have gotten this new job without you.”

He kissed her on her forehead. “You go figure out your life, poppet. Anything important will still be here when you get back.”

She took a shuddering breath, forcing herself not to start crying again. “Thank you.”

“And here,” he pressed a piece of paper into her hand. “Consider it severance pay.”

He shut the door behind himself and she unfolded the cheque. Her jaw dropped as she counted the zeroes. It was enough to pay off all her debts. On it was a sticky note, “If you try and give this back, it means you don’t think we’re friends. You don’t have enough of them to throw away the ones you have so easily. Put it to good use and a new start. James.”

She tucked it into her purse. She finished packing, and took one last sweep around the room to make sure she had gotten everything. She brushed her hand across Michael’s tie that he had left on the table. She grabbed her one day sober cupcake off of the table and pulled her suitcase behind her.

Her life wasn’t over, just this chapter in it. She would go find a new start once again. 


	18. Intermission

_Halla: I hate it here._

James: You’ve been there three days

_Halla: It’s cold, it’s ugly, the food tastes funny, and I can’t understand what anyone is saying._

James: That’s what happens when you move to Hungary in February.

_Halla: I think I’m going to come back to London._

James: No, you’re not.

_Halla: why not?_

James: Because you’re not allowed to run away when things get tough anymore.

_Halla: I’m not running away. I just don’t want to do this._

James: Poppet, you know I love you like a daughter, so I’m going to tell you something your parents should have and apparently haven’t.

_Halla: What?_

James: You have the emotional coping skills of an eleven year old.

_Halla: I do not! It’s just that things are hard when you’re an alcoholic._

James: No, this is more than that. I think the reason you became an alcoholic is because you don’t have any coping skills. Things got rough in your life and you used liquor to avoid dealing with it.

_Halla: You don’t know anything about it._

James: I may not, but from things you’ve told me, you got out of rehab and have been doing nothing about getting your life back on track ever since.

_Halla: I’ve had jobs and my own flat and stuff. I’m trying._

James: I don’t think so, no. You lived at your parents’ house until they made you move out and then they got you that advert job which you quit when you had a bad day, and then Henry comes along and gets you a job, and then you quit that job within an hour of having it

James: instead of trying to fix any problems you might have had, and then you hop right into being an assistant and then Henry disappoints you and you go get drunk and Michael is mean to you and you quit. And now you have the job you do now because I called in a favor.

James: You run away anytime things get rough. Sooner or later you’re going to have to face that you’re being the ball in a game of pinball and letting everything happen to you instead of actually pursuing a life you want. And that’s not because you’re an alcoholic. It’s because you’ve gotten older without growing up.

James: So use the time in Hungary to grow up and figure out what you want to do with your life.

James: Poppet?

James: Alright, but remember I’m here if you want to talk.

 

Two weeks later James got a package in the mail containing an iPad and an iPhone. A short message on a torn out piece of notebook paper simply read

_Sorry I shouldn’t have taken these with me when I left._

_Your new assistant will need them I’m sure._

_Halla_

He looked at the shipping address on the label and was relieved to see that she had at least thrown her temper tantrum in Hungary. He had a feeling that Halla was going to have a long five months ahead of her.


	19. Chapter Eighteen

Halla walked slowly down the pavement, looking in the windows of the little shops. It was so different being back in London and in a city after spending so much time in the Hungarian countryside. Everything was familiar but slightly strange; the blue of the sky was the wrong shade and the scents in the air were hard to identify.

She stopped at a little café to order a small black coffee and sat outdoors in the sunshine as she went over her list of things that she needed to do today. She’d dropped off the deposit for her new flat so she could move in on Monday, gone to a meeting, seen her therapist, filled out all the paperwork for her new job so she could start on the thirtieth, and filled out the volunteer paperwork at the youth centre. The only thing she still had to do was go down to the police station and fill out the criminal background check paperwork. She crossed out each item on her to do list with a firm black line, and stared at the other remaining item; the only one that she had written maybe next to. ‘Call Henry, Michael, James – tell back in town.’

She pulled out her mobile and pulled up James’s contact card. She stared at if for a minute before she chickened out on ringing him. Instead she sent out a text to all three men.

_Back in London. Staying with parents until my flat opens up on Monday. Start new job on thirtieth. Ring me if you want to get coffee and catch up._

She stared at it, analyzing every word to make sure that it conveyed the right combination of insouciant carelessness and ‘don’t worry about me, I’ve got my act together’ bravado before she finally hit send. She sat at the table sipping her coffee and reading for an hour with no reply before she gave up and pocketed her phone and headed to the police station.

That night as she sat on her bed in her parents’ house doing research on her laptop, her phone buzzed.

James: Good to hear from you, poppet. Finishing up filming Frankenstein, should be back in London in a few weeks. Plan on a good chat with coffee and sweets.

She smiled. For some reason she hadn’t even considered that they would be out working on projects.

About an hour later another buzz interrupted her concentration.

Michael:  ** _Good to see you’re back, Sassy. I’m on location for a few more weeks. Can I take you out to dinner when I get back and we can catch up?_**

Another one out of town. Her fears of having to deal with all of the relationships she had cut off without consideration at the same time were turning out to be misplaced.

_I don’t know, I’ll have to see if I can fit you into my busy social calendar. Should I have my people call your people? :D_

He quickly responded.

**_My people are post-it notes again. Do you have a person I can give a post-it note to?_ **

_I am my own people. Let me know when you get back and we’ll go do something. I hope you can eat carbs by then._

**_We’ll go wherever you want, as long as there’s something besides chicken on the menu._ **

She was just about to go to sleep when her device buzzed one more time.

**Hey Barbie, welcome back to the mainland. How was Hungary?**

_I hated it at first, but honestly right now I kind of miss it. That may just be because at least Hungary isn’t my parents’ house. I think my bedroom is exactly the same as when I was eighteen. There is a poster of Blink 182 hanging on the inside of my closet door. I am ashamed._

**You should visit me. No Blink 182 posters, I promise.**

_Where are you these days?_

**In LA. Finishing up pre-production for the next Superman film.**

_You going to be back in London anytime soon?_

**No. I was serious about you coming to visit me though. It sounds like you have a few days off before you need to move in and show up to work. Pre-production ends in a few days and I’ve got a break before production starts. Come relax in the California sunshine with me.**

_As tempting as that sounds, it’s really not in my budget right now._

**I’ll buy you a plane ticket, you’ll stay in my guest house. I’ve missed you. Come give yourself a few days of play before you buckle down at your new job. What is your new job btw?**

_I’m going to be a content advisor at the Royal Observatory Museum. They are designing new exhibits and they have a museum graphics designer person who knows how to make good exhibits but doesn’t have the content knowledge, so I’ll be working with him. And then possibly be developing new shows for the planetarium if that goes well._

**Barbie’s heading back to space.**

_It’s not a fellowship, but at least it’s a step back in the right direction. And I do get to help with the observing evenings on the big 28” refracting telescope._

**That sounds like a perfect job for you. Now say you’ll come visit me before you start.**

_I told you, I can’t afford it._

**And I told you I’ll pay for it.**

_I don’t want any more handouts. I’m determined to make it on my own._

**This isn’t a handout. This is me wanting to hang out with my friend who I haven’t seen in months. I can’t make it back to London because I have obligations here, so let me bring you here. I have a swimming pool and a hot tub and I’m right on a lake and we’re close to the beach.**

_You make it very difficult to say no._

**Just think. Warm sand, sunshine, the crash of waves. I can probably even find you a virgin coconut with an umbrella.**

_Ooooh, you’re exploiting all my weaknesses._

**Go paint your toenails pink and I’ll send you the information for your ticket.**

Halla stared at the phone as noxious butterflies swirled through her intestinal tract. He wanted to see her, but was he expecting to  _see her_? A plane ticket cost more than a lobster and she wasn’t sure about the state of their non-existent relationship.

_I feel weird saying this, but, you’re not expecting…nookage out of this, are you? I mean, we haven’t seen each other in months and I’ve changed and… I mean, I’m not saying there’s no way at all it’s happening, but I really feel like we should sort of start over with that aspect of things._

She hit send and then hyperventilated until he replied.

**No expectations other than hanging out with a friend. I promise.**

_Fine, I accept. Is there anything from this side you want me to smuggle over in my luggage?_

**I would say Smarties, but I’m not allowed to eat stuff like that right now.**

_Being an actor sucks. Maybe I’ll bring some and eat them in front of you so you can enjoy them by proxy._

**I’ll throw you in the pool.**

_Wow, touchy touchy._

She gave him her information that he would need to buy her a plane ticket and said good night. She lay in her bed, staring up at the ceiling, watching the dancing shadows cast by the trees outside her window. It would be a relief to get away from her parents who watched her like a hawk and sniffed her every time she walked by. As far as going to see Henry, she sighed and rolled over onto her side, hugging a pillow to her chest, she had no idea what would happen. She grabbed her little notebook off of her bedside table and flipped it open. Taped to the inside cover was the note James had given her with the cheque that had made her new start really possible. She had read it so many times that she had it memorized but she ran her fingers over the letters in the moonlight. She didn’t have enough friends in her life right now; she knew she owed James a huge apology for the way she had treated him. She knew he would forgive her and she hoped he would be proud of her. With Michael and Henry, her only hope was that whatever else happened, they would be her friends. Anything beyond that would just be sprinkles on the cupcake.


	20. Chapter Nineteen

Halla opened the fridge in Henry’s kitchen and was confronted with stacks of prepackaged meals, protein shakes and bottles of water. Sighing she shut the door and opened the cupboards looking for anything to eat. She had been disappointed when Henry hadn’t been there to pick her up at the airport like he said he would. A PA with a sign for Ms. Jónsdóttir had met her instead, apologized for Henry getting held up with some costuming issues, and had driven her to Henry’s enormous mansion. She had been shown into the guest house, pointed to where the door into the main house was, had been told that Henry had given her free reign of the entire property and he would be back as soon as he could.

She’d fallen asleep on the huge bed in the enormous guest house. Her old flat would have fit in the bedroom it was so huge. The one hour time difference between Hungary and London had been easy to deal with. The eight hour difference between California and London however, meant that she thought it was midnight and she’d skipped a meal. There was nothing in the kitchen that looked like it was actually edible though without getting into Henry’s nutritionist assembled meals.

She was shutting the last cupboard when she heard footsteps. Following the sound she saw Henry in the foyer struggling with the door while balancing four huge cloth bags over one arm and holding three pizza boxes in the other. “Henry!” Halla ran towards him to help carry things. He looked up when she called, grinned, dropped the bags on the floor and shoved the pizza onto a table. He swept her up in a hug and she threw her arms around his neck. She closed her eyes as he hugged her, relishing the feel of being held so securely after so many months of being with colleagues and strangers. She took a deep breath of his scent, shampoo and body heat mixed with cypress and juniper, and let it out as her fingers tangled in his curls.

“Welcome to California, Barbie,” he murmured against her temple. He set her down on her feet and she gawked at him.

“Oh my god, you’re  _huge._ ”

“That’s what all the girls say.”

She shook her head at his cheeky grin and cocked eyebrow. “You’re horrible,” she laughed. “But seriously you’re enormous. I mean, I saw you in the movie, but seeing it in real life is something else. No wonder you live in this cavernous hulk of a house. You wouldn’t fit anywhere else!”

“Have you looked around yet?”

She found herself yawning. “Not yet, I took a nap and just woke up a few minutes ago. I was going through your cupboards looking for something to eat when I heard you come in.”

“Well, you’re in luck.” His grin hadn’t faded since he had seen her. “I convinced them to give me food amnesty while you’re here so I stopped and stocked up on anything I could think we might want for the next few days.”

Her eyes widened with excitement. “Oh, you are going to love me then.”

“Why?”

“I have a ginormous box of Smarties in my luggage. I was going to hide them and then once you could eat again I was going to tell you where they were, but we are so getting hopped up on a sugar high together.”

He grasped her by the hand, his large ones completely enveloping her small one, his face a portrait of solemn devotion. “You’re right, I love you.”

“See, I knew that you would.”

He grinned and dropped her hand. “Now help me bring in the food so I can feed your starving little face.”

They ate pizza as he showed her over his house. “You really are a superstar, aren’t you? I mean, I knew you were Superman, but this is a mansion.” His lips squeezed into a bashful smile and she giggled. “You look like a little boy when you do that. You go from hunky sex symbol to a little kid. It’s very confusing for my lady parts.”

His laughter echoed in the hallway.

“Seriously though, you could play a rugby match in here. It’s enormous.”

“And you haven’t even seen my favorite bit yet.”

He opened a set of double doors and she stopped still, her jaw dropping. “You have a cinema in your house.” She turned to look at him. “Did you know you have a cinema in your house?”

“I did happen to know that.”

She found herself laughing, joy bubbling up from her stomach and releasing itself as sound. “Okay, this is what we’re doing tonight. We need the pizzas, and popcorn, and fizzy drinks, and maybe licorice, and I’ll go get the Smarties, and we’re watching something on this monster tonight.”

They met back a few minutes later with their spoils. “I got lost,” she said when she walked in to find him popping popcorn in the little kitchen in the back of the room.

“No, you didn’t.”

“I  _did._ I forgot about the staircase.” She threw him a tube of Smarties.

He ripped them open and popped a few into his mouth. His face dissolved into a blissful smile.

“Is that your O face?”

He laughed. “You’ll have to find out sometime, won’t you?” He waggled his eyebrows at her and she tossed him another tube.

“Maybe you should just keep eating these.”

She plopped down in the big overstuffed leather chair in the front row and opened the pizza box she had on her lap. “So, what should we watch, Superman?”

His bashful smile reemerged as he settled next to her, trying to balance a bowl of popcorn, bottles, and his precious Smarties. “I had to ask the makeup artists which movie had the line, ‘Boo, you whore’ in it because I couldn’t remember, but I thought we could watch  _Mean Girls._ ”

He brought up his digital video library and pulled up the movie.

She tried not to laugh. “You bought  _Mean Girls_?”

“Well, you said I had to watch it to understand you, and since I can barely tell what you’re going on about half of the time, I thought it would be a wise investment.”

“Four for you, Superman.”

“I’m assuming I’ll understand that after this movie.”

“Good looking and smart. I’m a lucky girl.”

He reached for a piece of pizza and she yanked the box away. “This is  _my_ box.”

He laughed, pinned her down, and took the box away from her. “Now it’s mine.”

“Meanie.” She stuck her tongue out at him.

“I grew up with four brothers, cupcake. You’re going to have to work harder than that to keep food away from me.”  He held out the box with a charming smile. “Would you like a piece of pizza, Barbie?”

She gracefully took a slice and then licked her palm and slapped it down on several of the other slices.

He picked up one of the ones she had anointed and started eating it. She watched him in disgust and he raised an eyebrow at her. “Like I said, four brothers.”

The film started and she settled back into the comfy surrounds of the chair. She giggled through the whole thing, and if Henry got more amusement out of watching her than the screen she didn’t mind. By the end of the film she was yawning, her body convinced it was four in the morning. She tried to hide her tiredness but Henry could tell she was fading.

“You go sleep. I’ll clean up in here, and we’ll go have adventures tomorrow.”

“I can clean up after myself, Henry.”

“You’re jet-lagged and the bags under your eyes are big enough to require a checked-baggage fee of their own. Go sleep.” He kissed her on the forehead, turned her towards the door and swatted her lightly on the rear. “I mean it. Go to bed.”

She yawned again, laughed and said, “Fine. Thanks, and I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Sweet dreams, Halla.”

She awoke in the middle of the night to the sound of thunder rolling overhead. She looked out the floor to ceiling windows and saw lightning flashing over the hills, the reflection fragmented on the choppy surface of the lake. Another roll of thunder caused the windows to rattle and she sat up in bed against the headboard and pulled the blankets under her chin. She was wondering how porny it would sound for her to go tell Henry she was scared of sleeping alone during the thunderstorm when she heard a soft knock on the door. It opened and Henry peeked in. “I wanted to see if you were managing to sleep through it.”

She shook her head. “I think we’ve already lost power, too.”

He nodded and came in to her bedroom. “Are you freaking out pretty bad? I don’t have hot cocoa to calm you down or I would make some. Except I’m pretty sure my stove is electric, so I don’t even think I could do that.”

“Can you hang out in here until it stops?” Halla fought the urge to slap herself for sounding so scared.

“Of course.”

She scooted over in the bed and he came and sat next to her and she rested her head against his shoulder. “Thanks for not laughing at me.”

“Why would I laugh at you?”

Her blush was invisible in the darkness, but it tinted her words. “Because I’m a grown woman and I should have outgrown this by now.”

“Says who?”

“Me.”

“You’re allowed to be scared of thunderstorms. Says me.” She felt him nod his head emphatically.

“Well, I’ll try and believe that. Right now I’m just worried if the wind is going to blow a tree onto the house.”

He shook his head. “There aren’t any trees close enough to the house for that to happen.”

“Okay, then what about lightning starting a wildfire?” As she said the words a thunderclap echoed overhead and rain started pouring down.

Henry’s laughter mixed with the thunder. “I think God wants you to stop worrying.”

Halla giggled and snuggled closer into him and watched the storm rage from the safety of Henry’s arms. She yawned and sleepily said, “It’s kind of pretty if you forget about how it can kill you.”

She must have fallen asleep because she woke as the sun rose over the hills to find Henry spooning her, one arm wrapped around her stomach, and his cock nestled up against her bum. She rolled over so she was facing him and he gave her a sleepy smile. “Someone’s got morning wood,” she said. His hand slid to her arse and tugged her closer as he rubbed against her, his eyes half-closed. “Would you like me to help you with that?” She pulled his head down to hers and kissed him softly, their breaths mingling in a foreshadowing of what was to come.

Clothes melted away as they kissed and she found herself straddling his hips and sinking herself onto his cock. She groaned at the feel of being exquisitely stretched by him as he held her hips and pressed upward, filling her completely. She started to ride him, rolling her hips in a slow steady rhythm and he sat up, pulling her flush against his chest, wrapping her hair around his hand and tugging her head back as he started kissing down her neck.

“Starting without me?” She heard the deep voice and turned her head enough to see Michael standing naked at the foot of the bed. She beckoned to him with a single nod of the head and he knelt behind her, pressing his chest against her back. She turned her head to him with a welcoming kiss, and she moaned softly as his tongue flicked against her lips. Halla nipped at his tongue the next time she felt it and he pushed into her mouth as his hand closed over her breast. Halla wanted to arch into his hand but her body was held tight between the two men’s chests, and she wasn’t sure if she was having problems breathing because she couldn’t expand her lungs enough or if it was because of the feel of too many hands and mouths and cocks rubbing against and inside her. Michael trailed kisses across her jaw, sucking and nipping at the soft skin and she whimpered softly. He kissed down her neck as he pressed two fingers into her mouth. She sucked them greedily, her cheeks hollowing around them, until he pulled them out and he slid his hand between her and Henry’s bodies and started to circle her clit.

“Fuck, Michael,” she moaned as she began to rock against his hand, changing the way she was riding Henry’s cock to grind her clit against the strong fingers. Henry thrust up into her harder and she sank her fingers into his hair to pull him to her for a kiss. He bit at her lip and sucked it hard as Michael squeezed her breast, tugging at the pebbled nipple. He twisted it just enough to sting as he scraped his teeth across her shoulder. She could feel every muscle and tendon in her body tightening around the sparkling ball of lightning dancing in her core. The storm from last night had left its spark in her nerves and every particle of her being was energized, waiting to be discharged in a single glorious burst of light. Michael leaned forward over her shoulder and wrapped his hand around the back of Henry’s neck and pulled him into a kiss. Henry moaned into Michael’s mouth as their lips parted and tongues found each other. She let her head fall back against Michael’s shoulder and watched the two men kiss, stubbled chins rasping against each other as their heads tilted and Henry’s full lips claimed Michael’s thinner ones as his personal property.

Michael’s fingers sped their pace on her clit as her breathing became more erratic and Henry’s fingers dug into her hips as she rode him harder. She could feel him pushing Michael’s fingers harder against her clit with every thrust of his hips. Michael bit Henry’s bottom lip hard enough to draw a moan and pulled it with his teeth, slowing letting it go before he started kissing down Henry’s neck. She leaned forward and kissed Henry, suckling his swollen lip. He moaned against her mouth and she wasn’t sure if it was in response to her kiss or something Michael was doing to him, and she didn’t care. Her head fell forward and she rested against Henry’s body, too caught up in the incipient avalanche of pleasure to support herself any longer. She could feel Michael’s cock hard against her back, rutting against her skin slicked with his pre-come. He was moving at the same rhythm as Henry inside her and he broke away from Henry’s neck long enough to suck at the soft skin behind her ear. She heard Henry whisper, “Come for us, Halla.” Michael pinched her clit between his fingertips and she cried out as the compressed ball of light in her belly instantly exploded, ripping through her like waves hitting the shore after a boulder has been tossed into a pond.

She opened her eyes to find herself alone in the bed, her orgasm coursing through her. Henry had tucked her in when she had started to fall asleep and had returned to his own room and she was grateful for the solitude as she found her hips rocking in time to the ripples of pleasure pouring through her. Eventually she lay silent and still, her knickers soaked, her breathing calm, and as she smoothed the sheet that had become twisted around her legs, all she could think was,  _Seriously, brain. What the fuck?_


	21. Chapter Twenty

Breakfast was awkward. Every time she looked at Henry moments of her dream would flash through her brain, leaving her confused and aroused at the same time. By the time they got out on the boat though, enough time had passed for her to just enjoy the feel of the sunshine on her skin and the spray of water the roaring boat sent up. They spent an hour just roaring around the lake, getting out the adrenaline and the urge to show off. Birds spiraled lazily on the thermals coming up from the hills, black shapes against a pristine blue sky. Eventually Henry killed the motor and they drifted aimlessly on the water.

“So, tell me about Hungary.” Henry said as they sat across from each other in the boat.

“I’ll talk if you get my back.” She tossed him the container of sun crème and pulled off her t-shirt. Henry managed to school his face back to neutral by the time she got the shirt completely off. The mint green ruffled bandeau looked crisp against her pale skin. “Is it safe to lay out on that rear part?” She pointed at the back of the boat.

Henry grinned. “Yes, that’s what it’s there for. And it’s called the aft.”

She shimmied out of her shorts and stepped onto the padded platform, pausing to catch her balance as the surface gave under her feet and then sat down.

He handed the container back to her. “Why don’t you get my back first, and then you don’t have to move when I’m done doing yours.” He sat down next to her and pulled his tee off and threw it back into the boat.

“Is there going to be enough left for me after I do yours, you enormous beast?”

He chuckled. “It’s probably a good thing you’re so tiny.”

She set to work on his back, frankly glad he couldn’t see her face. She had never seen a physique like this and as her hands made sure she covered every inch of the slab of man sitting in front of her, it was evident that her dream last night had seriously downplayed the size of him. “Is this as big as you’ll get or are you still building?”

“This is as big as I’ll be for this one. Last one I got bigger than this though, to help establish Clark’s size before he really becomes Superman.”

“I can’t even imagine you larger than this.” Her hands moved down the vee of his deltoids to his lower back. She added more sunblock to her hands and worked over his lower back, fingers slipping under the edge of his waistband to make sure that if the shorts moved he wouldn’t burn there either. At least that’s what she told herself. Henry didn’t seem to mind.

“It’s actually a bit obnoxious to be this large. My clothes don’t fit right. Cars don’t fit right. I’m always bumping into things. It’s worth it to play Superman, of course, but I’ll be glad to go back to my normal size.”

“Which is still larger than most.” She ran her hands up his neck and rubbed his ears which made him shudder. “Okay, I think that’s your back.”

“Your turn. On your stomach, Barbie.”

She stretched out on her stomach, resting her head on the built in pillow.

“Tan lines or no tan lines?”

She hesitated for a second and then said, “No tan lines.”

He unhooked the back of the bandeau and swept her hair up off of her neck. “That’s a ruffly bikini you got there, Barbie.” He tried to keep his voice light as he spent a few seconds appreciating the beautiful sight of her lying on his boat in just her bottoms.

She self-consciously reached behind her and smoothed the three layers of ruffles around her hips. “It makes it looks like I have curves when really I bare a strong resemblance to a pencil.”

“I promise you, darling,” he placed his hands on her back, “you look nothing like a pencil.”

She snorted and pulled her hair over her face.

His hands rubbed down her back, firm and warm against her pale skin. “You’re not a Marilyn, but you are…frankly, you’re damn sexy.”

Halla stayed hidden under her hair, not sure how to respond to that.

After a minute of rubbing her back, he said, “So, tell me about Hungary.”

“I hated it at first. I wanted to come home but James told me I wasn’t allowed to.”

He worked the sun crème up her neck to her hairline, moving the familiar gold chain out of the way. “He did?”

“He told me I had to stop running away when things weren’t exactly the way I wanted them, and grow up and figure out what I was going to do with my life.”

Henry started working his hands across a shoulder and picked up her right arm. “A bit harsh.”

“I thought so too at the time. But it turned out to be really good advice. I, um, I started seeing a therapist who does life coaching.”

“That must have been in interesting in Hungarian.” He rubbed her hand and fingers, working around the rhodolite studded band she wore.

She laughed. “No, I did Skype sessions with someone in London. I’m still seeing her. In fact I had to reschedule my next appointment with her because of this trip and she’ll be full of questions about you when I get back. Well, about how I feel about you now that I’ve seen you again.”

“She knows about me?” He repeated his actions with her left arm.

“I call you Edward, but I’ve told her a bit about you. Explaining how I ended up in Hungary required you to be part of the story, and you know,” she shrugged.

“I know what?” he asked when she didn’t continue. He straddled her thighs and placed his hands on her waist and slowly worked up her sides, his hands large enough that his fingers wrapped around to her stomach.

She didn’t answer as his hands rubbed the sides of her breasts and then worked their way back down. Henry was just making sure they were well protected from the sun, she told herself. “Part of AA is making amends for the wrongs you’ve done, and I need to apologize to you for what I did.” She paused as another boat sped by and they rocked in the wake. “I got mad at you for being with another woman when I had told you we couldn’t date and were just friends, and then I bailed on you. I didn’t really give you a chance to say anything. I just left because I suck at using my words – that’s my therapist’s words, ‘you need to learn to use your words instead of running away, Halla' – and I know that hurt you too and I’m just sorry for basically everything that happened in Rotterdam.”

“Everything?”

“Kissing Michael. Drinking. Not telling you what was really going on in my head. Running away instead of trying to fix things.”

He placed his hands on the waist of her bikini bottoms and tugged the fabric down a bit and rubbed sun crème across the newly exposed skin. “Who was the bite mark from?” The question had been tormenting him.

“I got drunk and ended up in a hotel room and um, yeah.” She shrugged.

He pulled the fabric back up and smoothed his hands over it. “I’m not really sure what, ‘um, yeah’ means.” He moved to her feet.

“You’re saying that you would like me to use my words.”

“Yes, I would like you to use your words.” She could hear the grin in his voice as his hands wrapped around her ankles and started working up her calves.

She took a deep breath. “Gaaaaah, why is this so difficult? She ran her hands back and forth over her hair, making it even more of an impenetrable mess. “I didn’t have sex. I couldn’t make myself do it, even though I wanted to have sex. I just didn’t want to have sex with him.  _Especially_  after he bit me.”

His hands were working their way up the outside of her thighs and all he could think was, _time to use your words, Cavill._ “Who did you want to have sex with?” His fingers slid under her bottoms.

“You.”

His hands helplessly closed around handfuls of her bum before he forced them to relax.

She hurried on. “It’s probably for the best that I didn’t. Who even knows what would have happened as upset as I was that night. The only thing that I don’t regret about that weekend is you flying in to see me. I started to think, to hope actually, that maybe you wanted to be more than just friends, still, even after seeing what it was like having to be with me without drinking.”

“I did.”

Halla’s heart plummeted at his use of the past tense. “I know that now. I’ve been hearing those words in my head for four and a half months now. Hungary was hard. I was lonely, and I never really learned much of the language, and we spent most of the time out in the country where it was cold, and sometimes I felt like my entire world was the costume trailer. But I also made some first steps in learning to use my words. When the crew would go out together, I would get teased about ordering a cherry coke, but I finally told them that I was an alcoholic and couldn’t drink, and this big guy, one of the pulley riggers, is that what they’re called? He stood up for me. Said his sister was an alcoholic and he’d punch the next person who fussed me about it. And it turned out there were other crew who weren’t going because they don’t drink – two Muslims, a Mormon, and two other alcoholics, so we started going out together. The rest of the crew called us something that roughly translated to the Kindergartner Biscuit Bunch or Cookie Club or something, but it wasn’t mean. They looked out for us.”

Henry had covered every inch of exposed skin with exceptional attention to detail, and there was no way he could keep stroking her body without blatantly doing it just for the enjoyment, so he sat next to her and did his legs and chest while he listened to her talk.

“So, with some prodding from my life coach and a little bit of ‘I am not going back to London without being able to prove that I don’t need your help’ I started listing out things I actually wanted to do with my life. Clothes are fun, but I don’t want to be a stylist, and I can run someone else’s life if I have to, but I’d rather wait until I have kids to take that on. So what did I want to do? And lots of emails and networking later, that’s how I’m at the observatory museum.”

She sighed and messed up her hair again and pounded her head gently against the pillow a few times.

“Okay, so I’m still learning to say what’s in my head instead of expecting people to know it and then running away when they don’t and this is probably going to be a horrible confusing mess, but I am now going to use my words at you.”

Henry smiled. She still was hiding behind her hair, but he could understand the comfort of not having to actually look at someone when you were saying things that could hurt. “I’m listening.”

“I like you. I don’t love you, but I think I could fall in love with you quite easily. When I was lonely in Hungary, you were the one that I wished was there. I fell asleep many nights imagining you holding me. I kissed Michael for all the wrong reasons. He’s good looking and nice and funny, but at the time what mattered was that he liked me. He wanted me, even knowing how messed up I was. And it was so  _nice_  to be wanted. But when it comes down to it, if I’m willing to be honest with myself and with him instead of running away, he was a replacement for you. I don’t know if you still are interested in anything, though the way you were massaging my bum earlier would argue you are, but um, I was wondering if maybe you would be interested in going out to dinner or a movie or something?” Her voice squeaked on the last few words.

Henry couldn’t fight the smile that was taking over his face. He’d spent the last several months wondering if he was ever going to see her again, if she was going to choose him or Michael, if he should simply give up and try and forget her. “I was wondering if you’re ever planning on coming out of that nest of hair so I can actually see your face.”

“Nope, not until I’m done being embarrassed.”

He picked up her hand and wove his fingers through hers. “Why are you embarrassed?”

“Because I am not good at using my words,” she said, the words muffled. “I still think running away is less frightening.”

He stroked his thumb across the back of her hand. “Running away might be less frightening, but when you use your words then I can use my words in return.”

She tightened her grip on his hand. “Do you want to use your words at me?”

“Yes.”

“I’m listening.”

He brushed her hair out of her face and leaned over so he could see her. “I’d love to go to dinner with you.”

Her eyebrows crowded together for reassurance. “Really?”

“Yes.”

Her smile was a pale imitation of his. “You’re willing to give me another chance?”

“Yes.”

She brought their clasped hands to her mouth and kissed the back of his hand. “I’m sorry I hurt you. I really am. I’ve thought a lot about how childish I was to basically take my toys and go home when things didn’t work out the way I wanted, and I can’t promise that I’m any better now, but I’m trying. I’m trying to be better.”

He stretched out next to her to keep from getting a crick in his neck. “And I can’t promise you that I’m going to fall in love with you again. You were gone for a long time and never contacted me. I eventually gave up hoping you would.”

“I know.” She brushed her hair further out of her face. “There’s consequences for my behavior.”

“But somehow I don’t think it will be difficult to fall in love with you again.” He leaned forward and kissed her softly.

“There’s lots of roadblocks ahead.” She kissed him back.

“Right now let’s just worry about dinner, alright?” His fingers flexed around hers.

“I’m not going to worry about anything. I’ve got sunshine and water and you lying next to me. For now, that’s all I need.”


	22. Chapter Twenty-one

They spent hours on the boat, most of it lying side by side holding hands and not saying anything or discussing matters of no consequence. They were scrupulous about not acquiring a sunburn and as the afternoon progressed hands started to linger longer than might have been strictly necessary as sun crème was reapplied. Their little idyll came to an end when Halla’s stomach rumbled demandingly.

Henry’s head tilted to the side so he could see her. “I guess I need to feed you again, don’t I?”

She stretched lazily, the sun having melted all her concerns away. “Eventually.”

He rolled onto his side and placed his hand over her stomach. “So demanding for such a little thing.” He squeezed her belly playfully and her stomach growled again in response. “I can actually feel that. It’s like you’re pregnant," he laughed.

She snorted. “That would take a miracle.”

Henry fought back a smile and Halla arched an eyebrow in disapproval. “I saw that, Superman.”

“Saw what?” He tried to look innocent but the few days of beard made that less effective than it otherwise would have been.

“The ‘mmmm, my woman has not been touched by other man in many moons’ caveman grunt of satisfaction smile you just did.”

His shoulders shook with repressed laughter and his cheeks rounded in a guilty smile as he looked at her out of the side of downcast eyes.

“See, if I was going to use my words to be an adult, I would say that maybe we should talk about sex before we actually have it.”

He sat up and crossed his legs. “What do you want to discuss?”

Halla started giggling. “I’ve never seen someone so eager to use their words.”

“I am merely supporting you in your attempts to use your words instead of run away from things. I am being a good boyfriend here.”

She pushed herself up into a sitting position, crossing her legs so her knees were against his. “Because you really don’t want me running away from sex, do you?”

One eyebrow arched and the other one lowered as he regarded her in confusion. “Why would you want to run away from sex?”

“Well because,” she looked into his bright blue eyes and slumped forward, covering her face in her hands. “Oh god, my old method of just slap a condom on it and pray was so much easier.”

He combed his fingers through her hair, the sun heated strands sliding through his fingers. He remembered this used to relax her and was hoping it still had the same effect.

“Maybe I’m not an adult enough to actually have sex,” she said to her knees. “If you can’t talk about it you shouldn’t be doing it, right? But I want to have sex. At least my subconscious does. Stupid dreams,” she muttered.

His hand paused in her hair. “Wait, are you having sex dreams about me?”

She sat bolt upright. “Dream.  _One_ dream!” She brandished a single finger in the air. “Sex dream.” She emphasized the em, turning it into a muh sound. “And Michael was in it too so don’t let it go to your head.”

If possible his smile grew even wider. “You had a  _threesome_  sex dream.” He nodded appreciatively, the tip of his tongue caught between his teeth.

“Yes, okay? I had a threesome sex dream with you and Fassy and I woke up from it having an amazing orgasm and it really confused me because why if I like you so much is Fassy showing up in my sex dreams especially when he seemed more interested in kissing you than me?”

“Hold on,” his eyes narrowed skeptically, “your sex dreams-,”

“Dream.” She waved the finger at him. “One dream. Singular.”

“Fine. Your sex dream,” he carefully enunciated the em, “is about  _Fassy_  kissing me?”

“You kissed him back.  You were very much the dominant partner.” She prodded his chest with a fingertip. “You were all yes, I’m going to put my cock in her and then kiss him into submission…” Her voice trailed off as her eyes opened wide in realization. “Oh…” she breathed out.

“What?”

She giggled. “Even the Fassy part of my brain is like, ‘Damn girl, get yourself a piece of that.’”

Henry snorted, bit his lips together to keep from laughing and then fell back against the cushioned platform as he dissolved into helpless peals of laughter.

She crawled forward next to him so she could look into his eyes. “And you were secure enough with it to show that it didn’t matter to you what my past was, you could deal with all the baggage I brought with me.”

His laughter stopped and his face softened as he looked up at her. “Do you believe that?”

“I think my subconscious trusts you.”

He tucked her hair back behind her ear so he could cup her face with his hand. “Do you trust me?”

Halla looked at him for a few seconds before she answered. She expected to feel a jolt of fear or butterflies in her stomach or something chaotic or turbulent. Instead she felt at peace. “I do. I don’t think you would do anything to hurt me.”

He sat up, and Halla wasn’t so lost in his eyes that she couldn’t appreciate the way his stomach flexed as he pulled himself up to a sit without using his hands for support. She sat back on her rear, and they were hip to hip, facing in opposite directions. “I wouldn’t. Not on purpose.”   He reached over her and placed his hand next to her hip, leaning on it so his face was in front of hers. “Are you nervous about having sex with me?”

Her eyes flicked back and forth as she scrutinized his face, and then dropped to his lips, and then fell to her hands in her lap. She twisted the ring on her finger and didn’t say anything.

“Can I ask why?”

He watched her lips scrunch and squirm as she fought for the words to use. “Because you are a large person and I am a small person and I am assuming,” she paused and gesticulated wildly as she tried to think of a polite way to say what she needed to say, “you are,” one hand flapped in the general direction of his waist, “proportionately large,” she said in a strangled voice, “and I haven’t had sex in so long that I’m pretty sure I revirginated and it’s going to hurt and I think,” her voice went from panic to embarrassment as she buried her face in her hands again, “I think I forgot how to do it.”

He kissed the side of her face, where he could find it between her hair and her hand. “We’ve got plenty of time, Halla. I’m not going to rush you into anything you’re not ready to do.” He slowly brushed back her hair as he talked. “And even when we do have sex, if we do, whenever that might be, we’ll take plenty of time.” He hooked a finger around her hand and tugged it gently away from her face. “It’s not going to hurt.”

She looked up at him through her lashes, pulled by the honesty in his voice.

“I’m not going to hurt you, my Halla. And if my memory of that night on your sofa is anything to judge by, I’m pretty sure you haven’t forgotten nearly as much as you think you have.” She ducked her chin and blushed at the memory of straddling his lap, of rubbing against him, of feeling him hardening in response, of the heat of his kisses and the feel of his hands on her bum. The heat that had burned through her that night started to warm her again and the embarrassment faded away.

She looked up at him again. “I would like to kiss you now.”

“I like this whole using your words kick you’re on,” he murmured as he leaned in towards her.

“I think I like it too.” She brushed her lips against his. “In fact, I know I like it.” She kissed him again, and it was better than her dream. His lips were warm from the sun, and he smelled like coconuts as his hand moved from by her hip to around her waist. She twisted into him, one hand on his shoulder, the other curling into the hair on his chest. Henry had been serious about not rushing her, and they softly kissed as the boat swayed gently underneath them. Halla felt the sunlight condensing inside her, collecting in a glowing pool in her stomach, as he finally tilted his head and coaxed her lips open.

Her fingers tightened on his shoulder as their tongues grazed each other. She let out a soft little moan and Henry pulled her into his lap. Halla slid her arms around his neck, letting her hands tangle in his curls. She had a feeling they would be cut soon for filming and wanted to enjoy them for every minute it was possible. He pressed her to him, a muscular arm wrapped firmly around her back. His hand rested on her hip and he slipped his thumb under the waistband of her bottoms. Halla’s skin felt stretched tight over her body, making it difficult to breathe normally. Memories of previous kisses tore through her mind. She had convinced herself she was exaggerating his skill, but she was discovering that her memories were a pale reflection of reality. He wasn’t even doing anything with his hands, just holding her in his arms, but the way his lips moved with hers, the feel of them pressing against her, the pauses between kisses when their mouths would hover millimeters apart making the act of breathing a lover’s caress, the tease of his tongue licking against her lips, the promise of it pressing deep into her mouth, even the way he watched her, mesmerized by her face, when they paused for air, all of it combined and she found her hands fisting in his hair as she squirmed in his lap, squeezing her thighs together against the building pressure.

Halla moaned Henry’s name right as a boy’s voice cut through the air.

“Get a room!” The high whine of a jetski engine trailed behind the words and the boat swayed in the small wake of the departing vehicle.

Halla giggled and rested her head against Henry’s shoulder. “Apparently other people are using their words too.”

Henry smiled and kissed her temple. “I need to feed you anyway before you start gnawing on my arm.”

He stood with her in his arms and then gently set her on her feet. “Alright.” He helped her back down into the body of the boat. “You want to steer?”

“You’re going to trust me with your boat?”

“I trust you with more important things than my boat.”

She shook her head. “No fair saying things like that because then I can’t use my words because I don’t know what to say.”

He grinned at her. “Come on; let me show you how to drive this thing.”

He stood behind her as she steered, partly to keep her from falling over when she would cross the wakes of other boats, which she seemed inclined to do. “It’s like having your own roller coaster,” she yelled at him over the roar of the engine. She reluctantly let him dock the boat, insisting it couldn’t be that hard, but he told her he wanted her to be a bit more comfortable behind the wheel – I only freaked out one other boat! – before he let her dock. He didn’t relinquish her hand as they walked up the path to his house.

“I’m not on the pill,” Halla said out of nowhere.

Henry stopped. “What was that?”

“I’m not on the pill.” She tugged his hand and he started walking again. “I thought I should tell you that. I have condoms, but if you have a particular brand you like, I thought that since we’re going out to dinner that if you needed to go to a chemist’s shop I would let you know now. Rather than later. Like, if you’re allergic to latex.  Or something.” Halla heard the words come out in a jumbled mess, but she thought she had gotten out all the important information.

Henry nodded, his cheeks rounding in amusement again. “No, I’m good.”

“Right.” She paused for a few seconds and then hurried on. “And I’m clean. I mean, I tested clean for everything when I was in rehab and I haven’t done anything since. In case,” she paused, “in case you were worried about what I did when I was drunk.”

He stopped and pulled her to a stop too. She looked up at him questioningly. “I don’t worry about your past. You’ve made a fresh start, and I want you to be able to leave all of that behind you without worrying that I’m going to dig it up. And I’m clean too. The producers had a full physical done as part of insuring me, so there’s nothing you need to worry about with my past either.” He laughed and kissed her softly. “I think this is the most responsible conversation I have ever had about sex in my life with someone who wasn’t already naked.”

“I’m reading a book about how adults are supposed to behave. It’s quite enlightening.” She sighed softly, sounding discouraged. “And long.”

“There is one question I would like to ask you before we leave all our pasts behind us.”

Halla’s heart hammered a bit harder in her chest. “What’s that?”

“Who bit you?”

“Why?”

“So I can punch him in the face.”

She laughed at his petulant expression. “That’s why I’m not going to tell you.”

“Come on,” he insisted, “the man deserves to be punched.”

She shook her head. “We were both drunk; maybe he thought I liked it rough. I don’t know. But I’m not going to tell you because you might work with him someday and I don’t want it to be awkward.”

The muscles in his jaw flexed as he fought with the desire to insist that she tell him who it was. “Fine. But if lays a hand on you again, I get to punch him in the face.”

She smiled in lieu of laughing at him again. “That is an acceptable compromise.”

He nodded, his jaw still more prominent than usual. “Ready for an early dinner?”

She nodded in response. “And after that,” she took a deep breath, “we’ll see what the evening holds.”


	23. Chapter Twenty-two

The door shutting behind them as they came home from dinner seemed particularly loud to Halla. They’d driven an hour down the coast to Venice Beach where Henry had introduced her to the weird combination of muscle men, artists, skateboarders, old hippies, and young potheads that made up the experience. They spent hours walking the boardwalk, eating funnel cake and ice cream and fish tacos and anything else that caught the attention of their nose. They went ziplining and Henry talked her out of getting a tattoo and they watched street performers of every level of talent and skateboarders defy gravity and graffiti artists create stunning works of art with a few spray cans. Halla talked Henry into dancing with her at the enormous drum circle and they walked hand in hand through the surf on their way back up the beach. As they drove back up Highway One, Halla watched the sun set over the ocean, alternating between staring at the orange orb sink into the water as it painted the sky like Monet and looking at Henry’s face.

The sky was an impressionist masterpiece, but Henry was a Bernini. Chiseled out of stone and human to the touch, his skin was warm and giving as she held his hand. Her fingers played along his arm as they drove, exploring the calluses across the base of his fingers, the feel of his smooth skin on his wrist, the crisp tickle of the hairs on his arm. She interlinked her fingers with his and watched the muscles in his forearm shift as he brought her hand to his mouth to kiss. He rested their joined hands on his leg and she could feel the flex of his thigh as he navigated the winding highway and roads back up to his home, braking into curves and accelerating out of them. The sky bled out its color and the bruised heavens faded to black and sparkled into beauty. Halla leaned her head against the window and stared up at the stars that glimmered into view as they made their way up into the hills.

After hours of the absurd and divine mixed together, she stood in the foyer of Henry’s home and let the faint echo of the door shutting fade into silence.

“What do you want to do now?” he asked, the words portentous in this crossroads moment.

“I was thinking about going to bed,” Halla answered as she looked up at him. Disappointment flickered and was quickly extinguished in his eyes.

“You must be tired. It’s been a long day and you’re still half on London time.”

Her lips curved into a soft smile. “I forgot a word. I was thinking about going to  _your_ bed.”

The light rekindled in his eyes. “Well, you are still learning. I can forgive the lapse.”

“Take me to bed, Henry. Please?”

His breath caught and then his exhale turned into a smile. “Of course.”

He picked her up and carried her as she rested her head against his shoulder. Peace flirted with nervousness in her stomach, but an overwhelming sense of wellbeing pervaded her skin. She saw very little of his bedroom as her sight was fixated on the pulse in his throat and the way his Adam’s apple moved when he swallowed. The feel of cotton against her skin, his hands stripping off her sandals, the dip of the mattress as he climbed on the bed beside her, the gentle skim of his hand over her body and she turned on her side to face him.

He traced the lines of her face with a fingertip, across her brow, down her nose, the line of cheek and jaw, the curve of her bottom lip, the angle of her chin. His eyes followed his finger, memorizing her face with an intensity that made Halla hold her breath, not wanting to disturb his study. Her eyelids fluttered like a new butterfly drying its wings as he leaned into towards her and she shakily exhaled as she leaned into him.

There was no movement. Other than the pounding of her heart echoing in her ears, it was perfectly silent. There was a pause, the vacuum holding its breath before the spark that will change everything, create everything new and combine matter into what matters. Then their lips touched, and the void was filled with something new and inexplicable and magic.

His hand wrapped around the back of her head and her hand wrapped around his forearm and they kissed with an increasing intensity. Halla gave herself to him, one kiss at a time, and Henry took them from her, filling in all those cracks and holes the months without contact had eroded in the affection he had built for her. Then he gave his kisses to her, building a path forward that spanned the troubles and difficulties they both knew were ahead of them. Together, as he pressed her onto her back and began to kiss down her neck, they moved forward.

Halla’s hands sunk into his hair. He’d worn a cap and sunglasses at the beach and she had wanted to take it off the entire time so she could watch the breeze play with them, but here she could do what she wanted. His mouth moved slowly down her neck and she arched her head backwards so he could have unfettered access to her skin. His stubble made a rough counterpoint to the softness of his kisses and then he nipped softly and she scraped her nails against his scalp. He groaned softly against her neck and licked the mark he had made.

Henry couldn’t believe how delicate her skin was. Even after having touched it all day, there was something different about feeling it under his lips. He felt Halla’s hands pulling up his shirt and he sat up enough to help her pull it off. She pushed at him, knowing that she couldn’t move him if he wanted to stay but he rolled onto his back with a smile. She leaned over him and shook her head. “There so much of you I don’t know where to start.”

She straddled his waist and ran her hands from where her thighs rested against his sides up over his chest. Henry let his hands rest on her hips as she explored. She ran her fingers through his chest hair, tugging at it gently. She bent and kissed his throat, and he found himself letting his head fall back for her just like she had for him. She traced the tendon in his neck with her tongue and followed it to his shoulder. She ran her hands over his shoulders, investigating the hills and valleys of his muscled body. Henry slid his hands under her shirt, letting his fingertips discover the strong line of her spine, the curves of her ribcage, the swells of her breasts. She moaned against his chest as his hands closed over her bra. He squeezed and she flicked his nipple with her tongue. He shuddered under the caress and she did it to the other one.

He grabbed the hem of her shirt and pulled it off, leaving her in a pink lace bra that he wanted to remove as well. Halla felt his hands on her back and tried not to laugh as he couldn’t find the clasp. She pulled the stretchy lace off over her head. “One of the few good things about small breasts – cute little things that masquerade as bras but really are just for fun.”

He closed his hands over her breasts and her eyes closed at the warm touch. “I think they’re perfect.” She opened her eyes to see if he was teasing her but there was no hint of mockery in the way he was looking at her.

He rolled over with her and bent his head to her breasts. His tongue circled one pink nipple until she was grabbing his hair again as his hand massaged her other breast. She bent under him, pressing up against his mouth as her hands moved to his shoulders and his back. He sucked the hardening peak into his mouth, teasing it with his teeth and she dug her nails into his skin. He sucked it into a perfectly hard pebble and then moved his mouth to her other breast. He teased her damp nipple with his thumb, keeping it hard and exquisitely sensitive. He pulled back far enough to breath against the wet skin and smiled as she shuddered before he went back to suckling at the little nub. Halla hooked her legs around him, letting her feet rest against the back of his knees as she felt the lazy heat in her bones start to wake and stretch its reach in preparation for leaping to life.

Halla stroked his back, his shoulders, the curve and dip of his bicep and tricep, the vee of his deltoids, all warm and taut and shifting under her touch. He started to kiss down her chest, placing soft touches of his lips against her sternum, the outline of her rib cage, her sucked in stomach, the hollow of her navel. He kissed along the waist of her shorts as he undid the button. The sound of the zipper rasped through the air as he dragged the metal tab down. He met her eyes as he started to tug them down and she lifted her hips for him. She closed her eyes as he hooked his thumbs through her knickers and pulled them down as well. She felt his lips press a kiss to her hip. “Nice tan line.”

She smiled in spite of herself and then felt him stretch out next to her again. He kissed her again and she parted for him. She still tasted of candy floss somehow and he wrapped her hair around his fingers like he was spinning candy floss of his own. His other hand rested on her waist as he kissed her jaw and down her delicate throat. Eventually his hand made its way between her thighs and she rocked up against him. He teasingly stroked the damp skin until she was whining helplessly in her throat. He stroked up and down her slit as she pressed up against him and he finally pressed between the damp folds and skimmed over her clit.

“Henry,” she gasped as her thighs quivered. Such a sweet word when she said it. His finger slid down and circled her entrance, picking up more of her moisture and then back up to her clit where he gently brushed the soft little nub. She cried his name again as he started to circle it and she grabbed his shoulders, holding on to him as if she was scared of what was going to happen. He repeated that circuit, down to pick up her liquid and back to her clit, each time with a little more pressure and a little faster.

He propped himself up on his elbow so he could watch her reaction as on his next trip he slowly pressed his finger inside her. He dipped in to the first knuckle and paused as her eyes rolled back and he stretched his shoulder under her wildly clutching fingers. He slowly stroked in and out of her, pressing in deeper with each repetition until he could press his palm again her clit. Her body was starting to flush pink over the golden glow it had acquired earlier that day.

Halla could feel him hardening against her hip as he pumped his finger in and out of her, but then he pressed a second finger inside of her and she stopped paying attention to much beyond the feeling he was creating deep in her belly. “Halla, baby, you are so beautiful,” he whispered to her as he bent his fingers inside her, searching for her g-spot. He found the slightly rougher spot and pressed on it gently, not sure yet of how sensitive her body was. She groaned and her thighs clamped around his hand in surprise before they loosened again. He brushed against it again and her nails raked down his back. He was positive she had left welts but he didn’t care. He started circling her clit with his thumb as he pumped his fingers in and out of her, crooked to hit that spot every time. Her hips moved with his hand, the circular rotation brushing against his cock. He continued to harden against her as he sped the pace at which his fingers moved and she dug her fingers into his shoulder as her thighs began to tremble.

“Henry!” His name echoed in the large room, and he could feel how close she was as she squeezed her already tight walls around his fingers. There was another rush of her wetness as he rubbed the underside of her swollen clit.

“Come for me, Halla. Come for me, baby,” he whispered against her lips as he bent to kiss her. She was straining after it, her heels digging into the sheets as she rocked her hips against his hand. He dragged his fingernail against her clit and her back bowed as she cried out his name again. Her fingers closed painfully in his hair but he forgot about any pain as he watched her come apart. She didn’t breathe for what felt like forever as her body trembled, even as he continued to stroke in and out of her, spreading his fingers wide to prepare her for what was ahead.

She finally collapsed, gasping for air. Her eyes slowly opened and she stared up at him transfixed. “You are  _so_ much better than Charles,” she panted out and he laughed and kissed her.

“You are gorgeous.” He brushed the faint sheen of sweat from her forehead with the side of his thumb. “Absolutely breathtaking.” He pulled her into his arms and they kissed each other, her arms tucked between their chests and his wrapped around her back. One hand slid up her neck and into her hair, and the other slowly stroked her back, pressing her against him, finally coming to rest on the curve of her bum. Henry tugged her closer and she hooked her top leg over both of his. He groaned into her mouth as she rocked her wetness against his cock.

“Halla, darling, tell me if you want to stop,” he murmured. “Tell me what you want.”

She scraped her teeth along his bottom lip. “I want you buried inside me,” she whispered before she licked at the bite.

His eyes fell shut in a heartfelt sigh of relief and he rolled over and grabbed a condom from the bedstand. He rolled it on and then laid back. “Come here, darling. I want you on top for the first time so you’re in complete control.”

She straddled his hips and leaned forward to kiss him, her hands on either side of his head. The nervousness flared in her belly and then calmed as his hands stroked from her shoulder blades down to her hips and rested there patiently as they kissed. She started to slowly rock against him, feeling the size of him rubbing against her clit. She walked her hands down his chest as she sat up, and then reached between their bodies to wrap her fingers around his cock. She stroked it up and down her lips and then brought it to her entrance. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes as she started to sink onto it.

Henry watched, mesmerized, as she took him. Her hands were splayed across his stomach and as she took the first few inches, her head fell back. It was slow and beautiful and his thighs were trembling with his effort to not thrust up and impale her, to feel her wet heat surrounding all of him. She was almost unbelievably tight and he moved his hands from her hips to the sheet under him out of fear of leaving bruises on her hips as he forced himself to wait and let her proceed at her own pace.

Halla moaned softly as she sank further onto him. It didn’t hurt but the pleasure was balanced on the knife-edge of too much as she worked him into her. Her hips rocked forward and back, taking more and more each time she sank back onto him.  Her entire body was tingling with the spill of delight at the feel of him stretching her open. It was exquisite to hear his breathing roughen and the tremor of his hips as she moved against him. Finally, when she could tell she had taken almost all of him, she lifted herself almost completely off of him, and then thrust her hips downward with all the force she could generate, sinking onto him entirely. Her head fall back with a sweet moan of stunned ecstasy, and she heard Henry groan in a much deeper key but saying the same thing.

She slowly opened her eyes and looked at Henry who was panting for breath from the exertion of keeping himself under control. She bent forward and kissed him and his hands fisted in her hair as his kisses were hard and hungry. She started to ride him, slowly at first and then with unhurried acceleration as she got more comfortable with the deliciously stretched feeling he gave her.

Henry started moving with her as she got more comfortable and angled his pelvis so she was grinding her clit against him with each rotation of her hips. Her hair was falling around her face and her cheeks had flushed an even brighter shade of pink than before.

“Henry,” she moaned, “I want…,” she whimpered, a high soft noise that spilled through him and left his body taut and rigid in its wake. “I want…” she tried again.

“What do you want, Halla?”

“You,” she gasped out the word, “I want you…”

“You have me, darling.” He grabbed her hips and thrust sharply up into her.

She cried out, panting repeatedly after the sound. “I want you…” she moaned again at his thrust, “on top.” She bit her lip and whined. “I want you to take me.”

Henry groaned deep in his throat and flipped her over. He buried himself within her and their cries echoed in the room. He could feel her knees pressed against his hips and he slid one hand down her leg, fingers spread wide, from her thigh down to her ankle. He kissed her as he wrapped his fingers around her foot and hooked it around his waist. Her head fell back as he started pumping into her, and he buried his face in the crook of her neck. Kisses, licks, soft little bites, the sound of her name torn from his throat; all of these vibrated through her body as the coil of pleasure tightened deep in his groin. Her hands were in his hair and he held on to his sanity long enough to slide his hand between their bodies and stroke her clit as he felt every part of his body tense against the imminent explosion.

“Henry,” she cried, adding her voice to the sounds of their bodies moving together, erratic breathing, and the moans of pleasure that poured forth from both of them.

“God, Halla, you are so fucking tight,” he growled against her throat. “Come for me baby, come for me, come with me, darling. You’re going to make me lose it, baby. Come with me, Halla.” He could feel his hips started to stutter, losing the steady rhythm that he had been following as he drove into her.

His voice poured over her, sweet and hot like liquid fire and she ignited like tinder in a lightning storm. “Henry,” she cried once more, and Henry groaned as she clenched around him. Her body quivered under him, and he could feel her legs locking into place around his waist as she climaxed. Her head fell back on a wordless cry of ecstasy and he let himself go with her, a few last thrusts as she raked her nails down his back and then he too, was exploding, pulsing and throbbing as he found his pleasure deep within her.

Stars danced for Halla, twisting overhead like the night sky on a time-lapse camera. Henry’s last groan of pleasure still echoed in her ears and she opened her eyes to see his head drop back down against her shoulder from its exultant height. She kissed his temple and held him as they both slowly sank back into their bodies. Eventually they moved under the blankets and Halla fell asleep curled against Henry’s chest. He stared up at the ceiling as he combed his fingers through her hair trying to remember the last time he had been this happy. “Good night, my Halla,” he whispered as he kissed the top of her head. “I love you.”


	24. Chapter Twenty-three

Halla panicked when she woke up. She couldn’t move and she didn’t know why until she realized that at some point during the night Henry had rolled over on his side, tucked her head under his chin, wrapped his arms around her back and thrown one leg over both of hers. She was very warm and surprisingly comfortable, but she also desperately needed to pee.

“Henry,” she whispered. He didn’t stir. “Henry,” she said a little louder.

“MMmmhhhmmm.”

“I need to pee.”

He shifted slightly, hugged her, and then didn’t move again.

Halla sighed. It would be funny if her bladder wasn’t causing her pain. She tickled her fingers against his chest.

“Hmmm?”

“I have to pee. You have to let go of me.”

He shook his head. “Nuhhuh. Mine.”

“I’ll come back. I really need to pee.”

“Teddies don’t pee.”

“What? Henry, I have to pee really bad. You need to let go.” She pushed at his chest but he was holding her so close that she couldn’t get any leverage. “Seriously, Superman. Barbie needs to go visit the loo.”

She felt a kiss on her head and heard a sleepy, “Good morning, baby.”

“Let me go!”

He jerked back and Halla scrambled off the bed and ran for the en-suite.

“What’s wrong?” he called after her.

“I have to pee!” She slammed the door behind her.

A few minutes later she came back out. “Have you considered getting a pet hippo? I think it would fit in the tub in there.”

He propped himself up on his elbow to watch her walk back across the bedroom. “Yeah, but you know how hippos are. First they are fine in the tub, but then they think they own the swimming pool, and pretty soon they’re inviting their friends over for parties and before you know it there’s an entire herd of them living in the lake, getting drunk, and going boat tipping.”

She laughed as she climbed back up on his bed. “I need a step-stool.” She crawled back over to Henry and flopped down next to him, her head on the pillow so she could see his face and not just his chest. “Who is Teddy?”

“What?”

“You wouldn’t let me go this morning. I kept trying to wake you up and when I said I needed to pee, you said, ‘Teddies don’t pee.’”

He rubbed a hand over his face. “Really?”

“Really.”

His eyes closed as he shook his head. “I slept with a teddy bear when I was younger. My brothers would try and steal it.” 

Halla watched the tips of his ears turn pink and fought back a giggle. “Okay, I’ll try not to embarrass you any more by commenting on how freaking adorable that is, but you sleep like a rock and I have a small bladder and if you’re going to use me as your teddy bear, I need permission to like, I don’t know, scream at the top of my lungs or something to wake you up.”

A devilish grin spread across his face. “You always have my permission to make as much noise as you want.” He kissed her and she wrapped her arms around his neck, playing with his hair.

“What noises am I going to make right now?” she asked, batting her eyelashes at him.

He smiled down at her. “I like the way my name sounded last night when you were crying it out.”

“Are you going to make me cry it out again?” Halla snuggled in closer to him, rubbing her hips against him while she trailed her hands down his neck and across his chest.

Henry gripped her bum with a firm hand and pulled her tighter against him. Halla could feel him beginning to stiffen and circled her hips slowly against him. Henry groaned softly as the teasing motion raced through him and set his skin tingling.  “I certainly would like to try.” He carefully stretched himself over her, still taken aback by how delicate she looked. Even with the golden hue she had acquired the day before her skin was still pale under his hand as he brushed her hair back from her brow and kissed her. She smiled against his mouth.

“I think you  _should_  try.”

He didn’t need much encouragement. His mouth moved to her neck, kissing softly as he pressed his knee in between her legs. Henry moaned softly as she ground her pelvis upward, rubbing against his thigh. Her fingers prickled with a need to touch him, and her entire body was driven by the desire to erase any distance between them. She delicately brushed her hands over his cheeks, his jaw, the line of his throat, wanting to learn him like a blind woman, through only touch and taste and smell. Halla tasted his mouth and he moaned at the flick of her tongue against his, and that was the other sense satisfied.

Knowing that she made him make that noise rushed through her like a heady brew of power, heating her blood. Her hands firmed against his face as they continued to kiss. She wanted all of him with an unerring urgency. Henry pulled her hands from his face and pressed them to the bed. “You’re such a demanding thing.”

She stretched her head up to him, her mouth watering with the desire to kiss him again. “I want you. All of you.”

“You’re in such a hurry. We have all day.” He nipped at her neck and she whimpered. Her hips canted up again as she ground against his thigh.

“Henry, don’t tease. I want you.”

It was like he was hearing with his cock and the sound vibrations of her words made him even harder. He pressed his other thigh between her legs and she purred in satisfaction as she wrapped her legs around his waist. “Say that again, baby.”

“I want you.” Her body undulated under him, rubbing her breasts against his chest and then pressing her hips up again. Henry rubbed against her and her breath caught and her eyes fell closed.

“You like that, don’t you?” He ground against her and she moaned, her fingers squeezing his as she tried to match his rhythm. “Don’t you, Halla?” he asked again when she didn’t answer.

“Yes, Henry.”

“God, I love your voice.” He licked her throat, kissing and sucking his way up the soft skin until he scraped his teeth against her ear. “Say my name again.”

“Henry,” she whimpered. He let go of her hands and she instantly grabbed his shoulders and raked her hands down his back. She slid her hands down his back and cupped his rear. “You have the most amazing butt,” she moaned. She sunk her nails into the firm curves and pulled him closer. Henry ground against her again, already rock hard.

Henry couldn’t believe the speed of his response to her. She was like an instant aphrodisiac and he was a teenage boy again. Just a few minutes with her and he was rutting like a bull. She was flushed a delicate pink, a shade he now knew from experience would deepen as they continued. He bit her shoulder, wanting to leave a mark, his mark, on that fragile skin. He wanted to be the only one who ever watched the blush start at her beautiful breasts and work its way up her neck, to spread across her cheeks.

She moaned again as his teeth dug into her skin. “Oh god, Henry,” she arched up against him. He continued the slow grind of his cock against her, feeling her wetness coating him. He could tell he was rubbing against her clit by the little hitches she would get in her breath every time he hit it. He couldn’t help himself.

“Baby, you are so fucking gorgeous. I know I should take more time, but I just want to be inside you.”

“Yes. Please, yes,” she begged. Halla craved him inside of her. She had never felt so sensitive to anyone’s touch before, but the softest brush of his lips against her skin, or the touch of his hand on hers sent an electric charge through her that she couldn’t explain. All she knew was that she needed him more than anything she had ever experienced before.

He reached for the nightstand and grabbed a condom out of the drawer and had it on in such a short moment that it almost seemed as if he really had acquired superhuman speed. He settled back between her legs and stroked her hair back from her face with both of his hands as he rested on his elbows. “Halla, you are so beautiful, so insanely beautiful.”

She paused in her attempt to line him up with her entrance as she was caught by the intensity of his face. He had paused to simply look at her and she felt her chest tighten under the impact of his gaze. He slowly lowered his head to hers, his eyes not quite shutting as he kissed her. Even as her eyes fell shut under the heat of the kiss, she knew his were still partly open, and while that normally would have been strange, that he would watch her, that he couldn’t bear to take his eyes from her even when kissing, it made her feel precious. He was watching her response to him, the way her lips parted, the tilt of her head, the way her hand clutched at the sheet as he started to press into her. She had wanted to learn him like a blind woman; he never wanted to be deprived of her beauty.

His hand slowly stroked down her leg like it had the night before and he guided her leg around him, getting her at the exact perfect angle to intensify the slow push of his cock into her pussy.

“God, Henry, you feel so good,” she whimpered, her hand in his hair matching the grasping motion of her hand in the linens underneath her.

He kissed her hard, stopping her from speaking, from weakening his grip on the small amount of control she left him with. She was so tight and he didn’t want to rush, didn’t want to force her open, and he needed to be able to focus to slowly rock his way inside her. Halla helped, moving under him like ocean waves, pressing up to take him. It had never felt like this before, and she didn’t know if it was because she wasn’t drunk, or if it was because of his size, or if it was because she was starting to believe herself in love with him. The only thing she knew was that she wanted him, all of him, and she never wanted to let go. She tightened her legs around his waist, her feet digging into the curve of his rear, and stroked her hands over his shoulders, feeling the hard muscles glide under the skin as he moved. Halla couldn’t stop herself from moaning as she pressed up against him, clenching the walls of her pussy around his cock and he thrust hard, pushing himself into her until he couldn’t go anymore.

“Henry,” she cried, and he would never tire of that sound, of her voice calling his name. He knelt back on his heels and looked at her, pale and beautiful against the dark sheets, and the cock-hardening view of her stretched around him. He slowly pulled out and then pressed in and he had to close his eyes to keep from spilling his seed right then.

He licked his finger and gently touched it to her clit and her whole body shuddered. “Halla, you are unbelieveable,” he whispered as he started circling the little nub as he slowly stroked in and out of her. “I’ve never needed anyone the way I need you. I barely touch you and you have me hard as a rock and I want you to come, baby. I need you to come for me so I don’t feel like a jerk for not wanting you to get out of my bed for the rest of your holiday.”

She reached up to him and he bent to her, kissing her hard as he continued to rub her clit. She wrapped her legs around him again, not wanting to let him go, wanting to be able to smell his musk and the faint traces of his cologne and let her hands slide over his body. “Make me come, Henry,” she whispered in his ear, and his head fell against her shoulder

“Halla, you have no idea what your voice does to me,” he moaned against her neck, rubbing his beard against her. He slowly thrust into her, wanting to make sure she came before he did.

“It’s the same thing yours does to me, baby,” she responded. His fingers hit the perfect spot on her clit and she raked her nails down his back, leaving red trails behind.

Henry repeated the motion and watched her entire body quiver in shock. “Oh, there’s your sweet spot, baby,” he murmured and started to tease it. His thrusting slowed to a halt as he watched her start to come undone. Her head fell back against the pillow, her eyes screwed shut and her hands dug into the bed as she gyrated her hips, keeping his hand at that exact perfect place. The flush heightened in her cheeks, now a brilliant shade of fuchsia as she bit her bottom lip.

“That’s right, darling, just like that,” he murmured. She tried to call his name again, to beg for that little extra spark but she could only get out the first syllable of his name as all the blood in her body was rushing away from her brain and into the seething pool of energy sitting right above his cock. She bit her lip so hard that it started turning white and Henry raked his teeth against her ear before telling her to come. “Right now, love, come for me, just come undone for me.”

The word love sliced through her like a razor and she cried out, a wordless sound of pleasure as she exploded around him. Light shot through her, and she felt like a pulsar, glowing in time with her heartbeat. Her breath came in loud gasps as her chest heaved, trying to get in the oxygen she had deprived herself of when she had forgot to breath as her orgasm had rocked her. Henry held himself still, wanting to watch her and not be lost in his own pleasure.

He waited until she could open her eyes before he started to move again. He knew it wouldn’t take long, not with how tight she was and the way her pussy had clenched repeatedly around his cock as she had come. She wrapped her arms around him again, her hands buried in his hair, and she moved with him, lifting her hips to meet each thrust of his cock. “Now you come for me,” she whispered against his ear. It was a scant minute later when she felt him start to lose control, the muscles in his back starting to tense erratically. “Yes, Henry, come in me. Please, baby, make me yours.”

She was his. He knew it. She was his now and he let himself go, taking the permission she gave him. A few last hard thrusts, a guttural groan torn from his throat as his head fall back, and he could feel himself coming, propelled forward like a spring-loaded cannon had been fired in his core. He was careful as he collapsed not to let her take all of his weight. He was fairly certain he wouldn’t actually hurt her, but he wanted to wrap himself around her and hold her close to him, to embrace her and not squash her.

They lay tangled together for a few minutes, not talking but idly stroking each other, before his stomach protested the neglect to which he had subjected it. Halla got the giggles and Henry rolled out of bed and disposed of the condom. “I think it’s time for breakfast, what do you say?”

She nodded and stretched. “I think I’ve managed to work up an appetite.” He tossed her one of his tees from the dresser before he pulled on a pair of boxers. “Think you can find your way to the kitchen by yourself?”

“If I get lost I’ll start yelling.”

“I’ll go start the coffee. It will be waiting when you’re ready to get out of bed.” He kissed her on her forehead and left the room.

Halla looked at the tee. It had a logo on it for what she suspected was a rugby team. She pulled it on and discovered that it hung almost to her knees.  She felt sated and tired and happy. She knew that she couldn’t stay on holiday forever, and that sooner or later they would have to discuss what it meant for him to be in LA and her to be in London, but right now, she couldn’t be fussed to worry about it. The only thing concerning her was her empty stomach, and she knew Henry would fill that for her, just like he was filling her heart.


	25. Chapter Twenty-four

_I'm going to put a NSFW on her just in case you have really strict workplaces. Nothing too explicit._

_[previous](http://notsomolly.tumblr.com/post/61484195298/it-aint-over-chapter-twenty-three) _

Henry opened the door to his house and smiled. Halla had found the stereo system. She had said she was going to stay and read while he went to some meetings with the director and costume people, but with the volume of the music blasting through the house, he doubted she was still reading. He stepped into the living room and stopped to fully appreciate the sight before him. Halla was enthusiastically dancing to a high-octane remix of “Halo” and “Walking on Sunshine” in way that reminded him of a sixties dancer, all hips and arms and flying hair. His head tilted to the side as he watched her with a growing smile. She’d changed out of his t-shirt and was wearing a skin tight faded blue t-shirt that ended just above her waist, red cheeky knickers, and red socks that went up over her knees. Amusement warred with arousal as he leaned against the wall and watched her.

She spun around and stopped in mid-hip swivel. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

He grinned. “Please, don’t stop on my account.”

She blew her hair out of her face and then ended up shoving it back when it all drifted back down into her eyes. “I was going to surprise you with my sexy nerd-girl outfit.” She went to the wall panel that controlled the stereo and stopped the music.

He smiled when he noticed the Superman logo on her tiny shirt. “Where did you get the shirt?”

“In the boys department.”

“It looks good on you.” His arms slid around her and he pulled her tight against him. “Though I don’t think you need an outfit to be a sexy nerd-girl. That’s just who you are.”

She snorted. “Yeah, so sexy that I can shop in the boys department.”

He stopped at the derision in her voice and looked at her closely. “You really don’t believe me when I say that I think you’re sexy, do you?”

A light blush colored her cheeks and she started playing with the button on his shirt. “I have the figure of an eleven year old boy.”

“You do  _not_ have the figure of an eleven year old boy.” He slid his hands down to her rear and squeezed her bum for emphasis.

“I have tiny boobies.”

He brushed his lips softly against her ear. “They fit perfectly in my hands.”

“ _Cantaloupes_ would fit perfectly in your hands.”

She sounded so disgusted that he started laughing. “Halla, baby, you’ve seen how I respond to you. How can you think you’re not sexy?”

“Maybe you’re just crazy.”

“Crazy for you.”

She looked up at him in disbelief. “Oh, I’m gonna have a heart attack and die from the cheeeeeeeese.” She clutched her heart and fell backwards, trusting him not to drop her.

“Does this mean I get to do CPR?”

She opened one eye and peered up at him. “You just want an excuse to kiss me and touch my boobs.”

“Because you’re sexy.”

Halla started giggling. “Fine, you win. I’m sexy.”

He pulled her back upright. “Good. Now I’m going to take that outfit off of you and show you exactly how sexy I think you are.” He paused for a few seconds. “I may leave the socks on.”

 

 

 

 

Halla sat on the kitchen counter watching Henry do something impressive looking with a knife and a bunch of mushrooms. He dumped the sliced criminis into the skillet heating on the stove and the sizzle of them hitting the hot butter sent up a delicious earthy aroma. Henry stirred them a few times and then walked back over to her for a kiss. He touched the star resting at her neck. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you without this.”

“I never take it off.”

“Never?”

She shook her head. “Not since I got out of rehab.”

“Is this your reminder to stay sober?”

She bit her bottom lip. “In more than one way,” she said quietly.

Henry stopped wiping down the cutting board and looked at her. “What do you mean?”

“This was a present from my brother Patrek when I graduated from university. He was so proud of me.” She fiddled with the pendant, rubbing her fingers over the tiny star like a worry stone.”I hit him with my car. I was coming home for Sunday dinner and I was drunk and I jumped the curb turning into the driveway in front of my parents’ house and hit the gas instead of the brake and I hit him.”

Henry placed a hand on her knee. “Is he okay?”

“He’s in a wheelchair and will be for the rest of his life barring a huge advance in medical science. That’s the night I went into rehab. That’s when my parents pulled every string they could to keep me out of jail.”

Henry had no idea what to say. “I’m so sorry.”

“If I could have one wish, it would be that he would walk again.”

“Even more than you getting your fellowship back?”

She looked up at him and let go of the pendant. “Absolutely. He shouldn’t have had to bear the consequences for my mistakes. I just hope someday he’ll talk to me again.”

“He doesn’t talk to you at all?”

She shook her head, her lips stretching into a frown that was holding back any need she might have to cry over Patrek again.

Henry went back to sautéing the mushrooms. “That must be hard to deal with. Our family is more beat the shit out of each other and get over it.”

She snorted. “Yes, well, you don’t have sisters and none of you are in a wheelchair.”

“That’s true.”

“You sound like you get along with your brothers really well.”

Henry smiled as he sprinkled a little bit of salt into the pan. “We do. It’s rare that you get all of us together anymore, but when we do manage it for Christmas or something, it’s always an occasion to remember.”

“I think I might like to meet your brothers some time.”

He turned to look at her and her smile gave birth to his own. “I’d like that too.”

 

 

 

Halla stared up at the stars. “You should get a telescope. There’s so little light pollution out here you would get amazing views.”

Henry stopped kissing her throat and sat back. “That’s what you’re thinking about right now?” He squeezed her bum as she sat straddling his lap in the hot tub.

She brought her eyes back down to his with a guilty smile. “Sorry.”

“You sure know how to crush a man’s ego.”

She slowly gyrated her hips as she pressed against him. “Nothing else feels crushed.”

“Yes, well, I think convincing you that you really didn’t have to wear a suit may have something to do with that.”

Halla blushed just at the mention. “Are you sure we’re not going to get in trouble for this?”

Henry chuckled and slid his hands back up her back so he could embrace her as she snuggled into him. “We’re perfectly safe. No one can see us.”

“Spy satellites.”

Henry’s laughter rumbled through her. “I’m sure they have more important things to look at.”

“Oh, so now I’m not important, am I?” she teased him.

He tipped her face up to him. “You are the most important thing to me. I love you, Halla.”

Halla felt a sudden flurry of bubbles in her stomach that raced up to her heart. Her jaw slackened as the words echoed in her head. “You do?”

“Yes, I love you.”

Halla knew what she was supposed to say, but the words lodged painfully in her throat. Her mouth worked fruitlessly; she couldn’t get them out. She could see a little bit of the happiness in his eyes fade away as she sat back and crossed her arms over her chest.

“It’s alright.”

“I’m sorry.” She couldn’t look at him.

He kissed her softly. “You’ll say it when you mean it.”

 

 

 

 

Halla lay in bed, snuggled into Henry’s side. They both knew her plane left in the morning and both of them had carefully avoided mentioning it. Halla thought about the last few days with happiness. The boat, going to the beach, the sushi eating contest that had left both of them with sore bellies, the skinny dipping, Henry taking her out to dinner at a restaurant built on a cliff overlooking the ocean, driving mindlessly up the coast, pulling out a picnic basket, and having their lunch supervised by a pair of curious sea otters who floated lazily in the water under the rock outcropping they were sitting on. So many perfect memories full of laughter and touching and happiness. She knew it couldn’t last but she didn’t want to be the one to broach the topic of her imminent departure.

“Stay,” he murmured against her hair.

Halla closed her eyes. “I can’t.”

“Of course you can.”

“I’m starting a job next week.”

He twirled her hair around one of his fingers. “Quit.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not? It’s just a job. Quit and stay here. Stay with me.” His hand closed over hers on his chest.

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

Halla tried to keep the exasperation she was feeling from showing up in her voice. “Stay and do what? Hang out around the house while you’re shooting twelve hour days at the minimum?”

Henry shrugged, shifting her head as he moved. “Work on your tan, go shopping, do whatever you want.”

“I want a job.”

He slid out from under her and propped himself on his elbow so he could see her. “Well then get a job here.”

“Doing what?” She tried not to roll her eyes but she could feel the irritation rising up her back like a rash. “Not a lot of call for astronomers in the city of stars ironically.”

“Then do something else.” He traced a finger across her collarbone.

“Like what?”

His finger stilled. “I don’t know. You could be my assistant like you were for Fassy.”

She sat up, pulling away from his touch. “But I don’t want to be an assistant. I want to be an astrophysicist.”

He sat up as well and reached for her hand. “You’re not going to be an astrophysicist though. You’ve said so yourself. You can’t get hired with your history.”

She pulled her hand free of his grasp. “Well, I’m definitely not going to be one if I quit pursuing it.”

His shoulders sank. “This hope of being an astrophysicist someday is more important to you than actually being with me now?”

Halla stared down at her hands in her lap, endlessly twisting her fingers together. “Part of AA is making amends to the people you hurt.” She sighed softly. “This is my way of making amends to me.”

She watched as his hands clenched into fists. “Are we always going to be tied down by fixing what happened in your past? What about our future?”

Halla looked up at him, noting sadly the firm set of his jaw and the pronounced tendons in his throat. “What about it? We’re brand new as a couple. We’ve barely been dating at all. We have time to be together in the future. It’s not like you’re never in London.”

“I’m going to be in LA or Toronto for the next year filming.”

She threw up her hands in exasperation. “Exactly. Even when you’re here you’re not going to be here. You’re going to be exhausted or gone. We’ll have no time for each other. So give me that year too. Give me a year to try and fix things and when you’re done with the press junkets for Superman versus Batman or whatever they are going to call it, we’ll get together and make some decisions.”

“So you expect me to wait for you?”

Her eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”

“Do you expect me to be alone for a year?”

“You have friends.”

“You know what I mean. You’re going to leave me for a year. Do you expect me not to date anyone?”

Her chest tightened painfully as she fought for a breath. “Is that a polite way of asking if you can have sex with other women while we’re apart?”

“You’re the one leaving me, Halla. If you were staying this wouldn’t be a discussion.”

“I’m not leaving  _you_ , I’m leaving  _Los Angeles_.”

“It’s the same thing.”

She shook her head. “No, it’s not. And if you can’t see the difference, then I don’t know what to say.” She fiddled with her necklace, pulling the pendant back and forth along the chain.

He grabbed her face and made her look at him. “Do you love me? You haven’t said it. Is this an ‘I don’t know how I feel’ sort of break or an ‘I love you but I have to go do this thing and I’ll be back in a year regardless’ sort of break? What is it that you want from me?”

She slapped his arms away from her. “I want you to be happy that I’m getting another chance.”

“Honestly, Halla, how big of a chance is this?”

“It’s really small. But it’s the only one that I have, and they don’t come along very often and I can’t afford to waste it.”

“So this  _tiny_  chance is more important to you than staying here and being happy with me?”

“I won’t  _be_ happy here if I don’t try this first. I have to try, Henry.”

He sat back and stared at her as the vein in his forehead throbbed. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed repeatedly. Finally, he said, “So I’m not enough for you. You’re enough for me, but I’m not enough for you.”

She threw up her hands. “Of course I’m enough for you. You have everything else already.” The words were coming out across a clenched jaw as her fingers curved into claws. “You have the enormous house on the lake and the boat and the fast car and the job you’ve been working towards for years. You’re fucking Superman. I’m the last piece to your puzzle. I don’t even know what the picture on my puzzle  _is_ yet.”

Henry let that sink in for a few seconds. “I love you,” he said quietly.

Halla looked down at her hands again, not having the response to that he wanted. “I know.”

“Doesn’t that matter?”

Halla made herself look at him, and the pain in his eyes made tears start to well in hers. “Of course it matters, Henry. But it won’t keep me from catching a flight to London in the morning.”

Henry fell back against the pillows. When he didn’t speak for a minute Halla started to slide out of the bed.

“Where are you going?”

“I was going to go sleep in the guest house. I didn’t think–,”

“No. Stay. Give me this last night with you. Don’t leave any sooner than you absolutely have to.”

 

Halla looked up at Henry. She could see the ceiling behind his head, but she was so focused on his eyes that it didn’t register. His elbows pressed against the curve of her shoulders and his fingers intertwined in her hair at the top of her head. She was surrounded by him and she surrounded him as she tightened her legs around his waist. Her hands continued their slow stroking of his back as they moved together. The air between them grew humid as they watched each other, sharing soft kisses. They had said everything they could already and neither one of them spoke as they made love, both of them trying to convince the other of their affection with their bodies. Henry wanted her to stay; Halla needed him to understand why she had to leave. Both of them fell asleep wrapped in each others’ arms with tears in their eyes.

The next morning, Henry loaded Halla’s bag into his car. They drove mostly in silence but as they pulled off of the 405, Henry again said, “Stay.”

She looked out the window at the urban landscape. Everything was so compactly built that it made her feel claustrophobic. “I can’t. I’m not going to stay, Henry. Please don’t make this harder for me.”

“So now I’m supposed to wait around for a year to see if you get a better offer from outer space?”

She turned to face him. “If being together is so important to you, then quit Superman.”

“Are you kidding?” He shot her a glance, “I can’t quit Superman.”

“Why not?”

He adjusted his grip on the steering wheel, forcing his fingers to relax. “Because I signed a contract.”

“Pay the penalties and break it,” she shot back.

He snorted. “I’d never work again.”

“Yes. Well, if I throw away this chance I may never work again.”

Henry ran a hand through his hair, tousling the curls as he scratched his scalp. “It’s not the same thing, Halla.”

“Why not? Why does your work matter,” she prodded him in the arm, “and mine doesn’t?”

“Because I’m–,” he stopped himself. “I’m not going to do this. It’s not the same thing and you know it.”

“It  _is_  the same thing. I’m not asking you to give up what you love and have worked for to be with me. Stop asking me to give up what I love and am working for to be with you.”

“But you’re not going to be an astrophysicist.” The words feel like rocks from his lips, one at a time, cracking together as they landed. “You screwed up and lost your opportunity. Fold your cards and walk away and start the next part of your life. The part with me.”

“Give me a year,” she pleaded. She placed her hand on his forearm, wanting to reconnect with him. The muscles were taut and strained under her fingers. “A year to see if I can make any progress towards my goal. I need to try. I need to know for myself.”

“Why do you want to waste another year of your life? You’ve wasted so much time already. Why can’t you see that you’re just running away from the truth; you need to let go of the past and move on.”

She flopped back against the seat and looked back out the side window. “Maybe I do. But maybe you need to stop running away from the truth, too.”

His eyes widened in surprise. “What truth am I running away from?”

“That it’s not as important to you who you’re in a relationship with as long as you’re in one,” she said quietly.

“What the hell does that mean?” It would have been easier for Halla if he had yelled at her. The cold polite venom hurt more than she had imagined.

“You broke up with your fiancé and a month later you’re in a serious relationship with the MMA lady, and you break up with her and less than a month later, you’re dating Kaley during a press junket so I’m not sure how you managed to found the time to fit that in. You haven’t had any problem replacing girlfriends in the past. I don’t doubt you when you say that you love me, but I don’t think you’ll have a problem replacing me either. You just need someone to love, you don’t really need me.”

“Is that what you think of me?”

She tore at her hair in frustration. “What am I supposed to think? I’m a cute nerd-girl right? And you love that about me, right? Because it means I’ll play video games with you and read comic books and we like the same TV shows. But this is part of me. The astrophysicist, gets distracted by the stars while we’re making out, going to give herself one more chance to make her dreams come true part is me. And you don’t love that about me. And if you can’t love that then I don’t know if you really love me. The whole me, not just the cute adorable parts that are convenient for you.”

Neither one of them spoke the rest of the way to the terminal.

Henry helped Halla out of his car and then retrieved her luggage for her. “I do love you, Halla. I think you’re running away from me like you’ve run away from so many other things.”

She shook her head. “I only run away when things go wrong. I have no reason to run from you.”

“So, then, I’ll see you in a year, I guess?”

She looked up at him. “Or if you make it to London for Christmas,” she suggested, hope in her voice.

He frowned. “I’m not sure what my schedule will be like.”

“We can always Skype.”

“It will be difficult with the time difference.”

Halla nodded slowly. “So I shouldn’t expect to see you or hear from you in the next year.”

He shrugged helplessly. “You’re the one leaving.”

Halla’s mouth pinched shut at his response. Her throat constricted as a ball of ice coalesced in her stomach. “We could make it work if we both wanted to,” she insisted.

“Well, apparently we want different things.”

“You want me even if it’s an unhappy me.”

He bent down so his head was on the level with hers. “I want you to come to your senses. You’re going to play with kids in a museum.  _You’re not doing astrophysics_.”

“It’s a  _starting_  point!”

“It’s a delusion!” he shot back.

She took a step backwards. “Fine. Count yourself lucky that you managed to dodge the crazy lady.”

She turned on her heel and headed for the sliding glass doors. She could see Henry watching her in the reflection, but he shook his head and got back in the car. She heard his car door slam shut as the glass doors glided shut behind her.

 


	26. Chapter Twenty-five

_June 27, 2014_

 

Halla sat on the burgundy leather couch in her therapist’s office. She traced the deep tufts with her fingertip. They had already talked about Halla’s transition to London and how she was settling in and if she was going to meetings and in contact with her sponsor. Halla knew she was running out of things to talk about besides Henry. 

“And how are you feeling after your trip to Los Angeles?” Karen asked, after Halla had talked herself to silence.

“Most of it was wonderful. The end not so much.”

Karen jotted something on her notepad. “Why not?”

Halla twisted her ring around her finger and wished that their hour was over. “He asked me to stay.”

“What did you say?

She looked up at Karen, certain that she had the right answer. “That I couldn’t. That I had a job here.”

“How did he respond?”

“That I could find a job there.”

Karen nodded thoughtfully. “I’m sure you could find a job there.”

Halla hesitated, confused. She had been so sure she had made the right choice. “Yes, but not _this_ job.”

“Ah. And this job is important?”

The irritation rose in Halla’s throat at Karen’s deliberate innocence. “You know it is. This could be my way back. This could be my new start.”

“He was offering you a new start, too.”

“But not the one I wanted.”

“Ah.” Karen wrote something down. “Why did he think you would stay if he asked?”

Halla looked down at her hands again. Having sex with Henry had seemed like a much better idea when he was in front of her than when her therapist was. “We were sleeping together.”

“Had you discussed what that meant before you did it?”

“Yes, I was good and used my words.” Halla had a sudden memory of talking to Patrek about a boy she had liked and him giving her the talk about how all boys were interested in only one thing. “We talked about sexual history and safe sex and everything.”

“No, you misunderstand my question.” Karen tapped her pen against her chin as she thought about how to reword what she had said. “Did you talk about what embarking on a sexual relationship meant for the expectations you had of each other?”

Halla scratched at her arm as her brow lowered in confusion. “I told him I wasn’t in love with him, if that’s what you mean.”

“Right before you had sex?”

“Earlier that day.”

Karen nodded. “And did you tell him that you weren’t going to stay in California?”

“Well, no. But he knew I had a job here and I had a return plane ticket.”

Karen nodded again. “Had he given you any indication of his feelings for you?”

“Well, he said he wasn’t in love with me anymore because I had been gone for so long, but that it wouldn’t be difficult to fall in love with me again.”

She cocked her head to one side and looked at Halla thoughtfully. “And what did you say to that?”

“That I liked him, but wasn’t in love with him, but I thought that maybe I could fall in love with him.”

Another emotionless nod. “And then you embarked on a sexual relationship with him.”

Halla let her hands flop helplessly to her sides. “Well, yes.”

“Do you think,” Karen sat back in the tall wing chair and tapped her pen against her chin again, “that maybe you gave him mixed signals about your intentions?”

Halla’s head started to hurt, like someone was stabbing her with an ice pick. She had been having this argument over and over with herself until the thoughts had worn wagon ruts in her brain. “But we’ve only been dating a few days. Why would he think I would move in with him?”

Karen shrugged. “Those few days have been spread over eight months. It could be that he feels he’s been in a relationship with you for longer than it has been. It could be that it was a way of preventing a long distance relationship. It could be that he thought you were in love with him and wanted to move in with him.”

“But I’m not in love with him.” Her hand jerked through the air in emphasis.

“Did you tell him that?”

Halla crossed her arms over her chest. “I never told him I loved him.”

“Why _aren’t_ you in love with him?” Karen regarded her with a smile. “You describe him as fun and charming and rich and handsome.”

Halla flopped back against the padded leather, hitting her head a few times against the tufting as if trying to jar the right answer loose. “I don’t know. I mean, other than that he kind of freaks out and runs away whenever something doesn’t go his way.” She stopped and stared at the ceiling for a while. “I feel like I’m not sure who I am right now. I want to be an astrophysicist. I’m committed to that, and I know there’s not a good chance I can make that happen with my past, but that’s my dream right now, and I feel like I have to put that first and see if I can accomplish that before I can be in love with anyone else. And so I need some time for me and everything else is secondary to that right now, and you can’t be in love with someone and put them always second.”

“Did you tell him that?” Karen gently asked.

“Not really. No. Not until after he asked me to stay.” Halla slouched down in the sofa so she could see Karen. “I hate using my words.”

“I know. You have that history, especially with this man. You told me the first time you kissed him was because you were afraid you hurt his feelings.”

Halla rubbed her suddenly sweaty palms against her jeans. “Well, yeah. It was just easier than trying to explain.”

“Maybe easier at the beginning, but look where it’s gotten you.”

Halla sighed deeply as she thought about her argument with Henry. “Maybe I should have told you my sex dream instead of him,” she muttered.

“You told him your sex dream?”

“Yeah.” Her face heated, and the tips of her ears began to tingle. “It kind of slipped out that I had one, and then he wanted to know what it was about.”

“Did you think the dream was a message?”

Halla felt the pit of her stomach drop and a sick clamminess take up residence. “That I wanted to have sex with him.” She twisted the ring around her finger endlessly.

“Dreams are dreams, Halla. Usually they mean nothing at all. If you had a sex dream about him, you had a sex dream about him. It’s not a sign from the gods.”

Halla raised her head just enough to be able to see Karen. “What if it was about me and him and George?” Her voice squeaked on the last few words. Just like she had given Henry the code name Edward, Fassy had been dubbed George.

“Then it’s still a dream. If I was going to try and tender any meaning to it at all, you having sex with both of them at the same time would indicate confusion about your feelings, rather than an endorsement of one of them. But usually a single dream is just your brain checking to make sure all the wiring is still working. It’s when you have the same dream repeatedly that your subconscious may be trying to work out something.”

Halla looked back at her ring and started twisting it again. “So you’re saying I shouldn’t have had sex with him.”

“I’m saying that you shouldn’t let your dreams tell you who to have sex with, and that you should make sure you and your partner are on the same page when it comes to the implications of having intercourse.”

“I hate you sometimes.” There was no emotion behind the words.

Karen smiled sweetly. “I know. That’s why you pay me. If you loved everything I told you I would just be your friend.”

 

 

 

_July 12_

Halla sat reading at an outdoor café, taking advantage of the beautiful Saturday sunshine. She looked up from her book to see James approaching and was surprised to see Michael with him. She stood to hug the men hello.

“You’re looking good, poppet,” James said as he held her at arms’ length and scrutinized her face.

Halla smiled. “And I like _you_ without the seventies hair. Much more handsome this way.”

James gave her a little bow of thanks.

“Halla, good to see you again.” Michael hugged her and Halla smiled at his easy acceptance of her again.

“You too, Fassy. How’s life been treating you?”

They all settled into their chairs. “Finally back from New Zealand.”

“You being an elf or something?”

He smiled. Halla had forgotten how many teeth he had, though she had gotten past the stage where she thought he looked like a shark. “No, I was filming a western.”

“Well that’s new and exciting. I wasn’t expecting to see you today.”

James snickered. “Yes, he found out we were meeting for coffee and begged to come along.”

Fassy grimaced as he turned to James. “I did not beg.”

“You did a wee bit.”

Fassy scowled at James, who merely raised an eyebrow at him in response.

Fassy huffed. “Fine. I may have asked once or twice. I just wanted to see how our Halla was holding up.”

“Holding up?” She looked back and forth between the two men in concern. Halla heard a thud from under the table and Fassy winced, his mouth contorting in an effort not to swear. Halla got a sinking feeling. “What’s going on?”

“You didn’t see the pictures?” Fassy asked.

“What pictures?” Her mind immediately flashed to spy satellite photos having been leaked onto the internet.

James punched Fassy in the arm before turning back to Halla. “Apparently someone took pictures of Henry having a heated argument with a woman at LAX a few weeks ago. You are ‘an unidentified woman’ but um, we recognized you.”

“Oh my god.” She put her head down on the table and covered it with her arms.

Fassy patted her in a manner Halla was sure he intended to be reassuring. “The pictures don’t show your face at all, so don’t worry. Very few people would know it was you.”

“Do you get used to this after a while?” Her words were muffled by her hair and arms. “I mean, not that I’m going to have to worry about it at all in the future.”

“That bad?” James asked.

“He wants something I can’t – he would say won’t – give him right now.”

Fassy’s patting had turned into rubbing her back. “Maybe it will work out in the future.”

Halla sat up and sighed deeply. “I don’t think so. I mean, he was a complete douchecanoe about it. Not that I was perfect as my therapist has so helpfully pointed out multiple times since then, but great sex can’t make up for lack of belief in someone.”

“Okay, one,” James said, “congratulations on the great sex. That’s always nice. Two, don’t date or anything else someone who won’t believe in your dreams, and three, when did you start seeing a therapist?”

Halla laughed. “Not too long after you called me out on my shit and I had a temper tantrum in response. I owe you a huge apology.” She put her hand over his on the table. “You were right. And you did so much for me. And then I acted like a five year old in response.”

“That’s what friends are for. We’re therapists you can’t fire.”

“Well, thank you.” She squeezed his hand. “For being a friend. And I hope someday you can forgive me for the way I treated you.”

James smiled. “You make good on your start and we’re square.”

“I really do love my job. It’s so wonderful being back somewhere that everybody is a space geek.” Her words were rushing out, like water from a spring, she was so excited.

“You do look happier than I remember you being.”

“I am. For the first time in longer than I can remember, I’m actually happy.” Her face glowed with happiness, and her cheekbones stood out because of her huge smile. “I’m doing something that I love and I have a few friends and I’m still sober and I feel more stable than I have in a while. I mean, I’m sure I’m a mess in the head in a lot of ways still, but I’m starting to feel less like a pinball and more like the paddle.”

“That’s wonderful.”

They spent the next two hours chatting, swapping stories of New Zealand and Hungary and the X-Men tour and all the things that had transpired in the months they had been separated. James finally said that he had to go.

“Michael, do you need to go as well? I was hoping to talk to you for a minute.”

“No, I can stay.”

They both hugged James goodbye and then reclaimed their seats. “So what did you want to talk about, Sassy?”

She took a deep breath as her fingers and toes went cold with nervousness. “I wanted to apologize. You took really good care of me when I crashed and I repaid you by throwing it all in your face and running away.”

Fassy nodded as he sat back in his chair. “You did what you thought you had to.”

“Well, I know better now. I was really selfish, and it was a confusing few days and you shared your heart with me and I took advantage of that, and I was horrible to you.” Her hope for forgiveness burned in her chest and consumed all her air, leaving her unable to breathe until he answered.

Fassy sipped his coffee and then set it on the table and leaned towards her. “You didn’t take advantage of me, Halla. You were quite clever in determining why we wouldn’t work and very honest about it as well.”

“And then I went ahead and kissed you anyway. I wanted to be kissed. I wanted to believe that someone could know what a mess I was and still want to kiss me. Apparently, I suck at using my words and prefer to just kiss people instead, and I hurt people and get hurt in return because of that.” She stopped and gathered her thoughts of what she wanted to say, finally shoving her hair back behind her ear and looking up at him. “I’m trying to make amends and be better and I feel sick to my stomach over the way I treated you because you didn’t deserve that. You were always honest with me and I could stand to learn from that example.”

“Just out of curiosity,” he stopped to stir his coffee, “did you ever care for me romantically?”

“Ooooh, you’re really going to make me use my words now. Um, there were moments where I definitely felt a spark between us. Like a sexual charge. And um, kissing you was…fantastic.” The last word came out breathy. Halla put a hand to her burning cheeks and hurried on. “But between you being my boss and me being hung up on Henry, I never let any romantic feelings develop for you. Anything you did that could have been interpreted as romantic, I interpreted as you being my friend. It wasn’t until after you forced the issue and told me how you were feeling, and then I screwed up so bad and you were taking care of me that I let myself wonder what it would be like to be in a relationship with you. You were so tender with me and thoughtful but you’d been such a jerk just previous and it left me all confused and so I ran away.” She fiddled with her coffee stirrer. “And I thought that was the end of it,” she whispered.

“So you never thought about me while you were in Hungary?”

She looked up at him, her hand stilling. “Sometimes. I would wonder how filming was going for _Macbeth._ And if you were cheating on your diet. And what kind of shenanigans you and James were getting up to on your press junket. And if you were wearing orange trousers. And if you still wore pyjamas or had gone back to sleeping in the all together. I guess I wondered how you were coping without me there to take care of you.”

“Did you like taking care of me?”

“It was fine. It was a job.” She shrugged. “You were always fun to hang out with. It’s not something I loved like what I’m doing now, though. I’m never going to be a woman who finds her life’s fulfillment in being a wife which is what I felt like. I need something else too.”

Fassy nodded. “You were right when you said that one of the reasons I liked you was because you made my life easier. I found myself missing you when I, you know, had to go to the market because I was out of food, or there were four back-to-back meetings and I would end up hungry at the wrong building because I got my schedule out of order.”

“Yeah, I suck at a lot of things, but I’m surprisingly talented at telling people why I wouldn’t be a good match for them.” She snickered but her laughter faded as she remembered that she had told Henry in Rotterdam that he didn’t love her, he just wanted someplace warm to stick his penis.

“I missed you for other reasons, too.”

Halla stirred her cold coffee, incapable of looking at him.

“I miss your energy and your smile and your sense of humor.”

She forced herself to make eye-contact with him. “I don’t know what you’re telling me.”

Fassy let his eyes roam over her face. His lips tightened for a moment as he scratched at his beard and then he said, “I hope that whatever happens with you and Henry, we can still be friends.”

Halla shook her head. “Nothing’s going to happen with Henry.”

“You sound very adamant about that.”

She snorted derisively. “Speaking as someone who is an expert at throwing temper-tantrums and running away when life doesn’t go her way, he has the same problem. And there’s no way a relationship works with two of those people together.”

“Is that the only reason?”

She picked at the rest of her croissant, tearing off tiny pieces and then tearing them even smaller. “You remember how much of an ass you were to me when I screwed up your schedule?”

He nodded.

“He was like that, but not about my skills as an assistant, but about my hopes for being an astrophysicist again.”

Fassy watched as her jaw hardened and her eyelids flickered. “That would be difficult to deal with.”

“I can tolerate it in a boss. It’s not something I would choose in a boyfriend.”

Fassy nodded. “Your heart is still there with him,” he said gently.

She managed to give him half a smile. “A bit. My head is going faster than my heart at moving on. I’m trying to convince myself that he would be a better honorary brother than boyfriend. We can fight over the last slice of pizza and talk trash about each other’s gaming skills. I’m probably insane in thinking that I can be friends with him though.”

He squeezed her hand once and then let it go. “Anything is possible.”

“So, you forgive me?”

He smiled at her, the gentle one most people never saw instead of the shark one. “Of course.”

“Thank you.” She gathered her things and stood. “And I’m totally going to live text you while watching _Days of Future Past_ when it comes out on DVD.”

Fassy’s eyebrows narrowed. “You haven’t seen it yet?”

“I wouldn’t have understood it in Hungarian.”

He nodded. “Right, I forgot about that.”

They hugged each other and departed in opposite directions.

 

 

_July 13_

**Henry: I miss you.**

_Halla: Well, this is faster than it took you to show up on my doorstep with those same words when you freaked out about me being an alcoholic._

**I was a jerk.**

_Yes, you were._

**How is work going?**

_I love it._

**Good.**

_How’s filming going?_

**We’re on schedule.**

_That’s good._

Halla waited for a reply but none came.

 

 

_July 15_

Halla walked back into work after lunch. She loved walking through the exhibits each day on her way to her desk, always noticing some small new thing each day. The assistant at the front desk of the employee offices stopped her.

“A man dropped this off for you while you were out.” She handed Halla a Waterstones bag.

Halla took it, wondering who was leaving things for her at work. “Thank you.”

Halla went back to her little office and sat down at her desk. She reached into the bag and pulled out a book and a screener of _X-Men: Days of Future Past._ The book was one she hadn’t seen before, _Brilliant Blunders: From Darwin to Einstein - Colossal Mistakes by Great Scientists That Changed Our Understanding of Life and the Universe_. She opened it and on the front leaf was written,

> To the greatest scientist I know,
> 
> I’m sure your past mistakes will lead you to a brilliant future.
> 
> Michael

She carefully closed the book and put it in her bag to take home with her, along with the DVD. She felt a warmth rush over her and linger in her chest. It took her a while to identify what it was, but she finally did. It was the feeling of being believed in.


	27. Chapter Twenty-six

July 18

Halla: _The costume designers deserve an Oscar and to be corporally punished for the ugliness of your outfits._

Michael: _ **Please**   **tell me you aren’t sitting home alone on a Friday night watching X-Men movies.**_

Halla looked around her little living room with a guilty smile.  _Well, I can’t very well have people over if it’s a top secret screener I have._

**_You know very well what I mean. Why aren’t you out at some fabulous party?_ **

_And I suppose that’s where you are since you are texting me back so promptly?_

**_I was on my way out. Should I swing by and pick you up? Loud music, ridiculously tiny hors d’oeuvres, the potential to listen to a celebrity urinate in the stall next to you…_ **

Halla snickered.  _I think you need to work on your PR skills. Thank you for the offer, but I’m already in my jammies._

**_Are you eating ice cream out of the carton and crying?_ **

_No._

**_Really?_ **

_Really, I promise. I’m painting my toenails._

**_50 quid on pink._ **

Halla looked down at the bottle of sheer pink polish on the coffee table.  _Am I that predictable?_

**_Only on your favorite color. The rest of the time I have no idea in hell what you’re on about._ **

And he called  _her_  sassy.  _Right. Have fun at your party. And remember, it’s okay to listen, but no looking._

**_Thanks for the reminder on urinal etiquette. I would have embarrassed myself otherwise._ **

_I know. It’s a marvel you survived as long as you did without me._

**_It really is._ **

 

 

 

July 20

Henry:  **I’m sorry for being an ass.**

Halla stared at the message for a long time trying to decide how to respond.  _What do you want me to say to that?_

**That you forgive me.**

She rolled her eyes in annoyance before she tapped in a reply.  _You didn’t ask for forgiveness._

**I said I’m sorry.**

_It’s not the same thing._

**Can you forgive me for being an ass?**

Halla tugged at her necklace as she read the text repeatedly. At least he was admitting that he had been an ass, though it had taken nearly a month.  _Why should I?_

**Because I’m sorry.**

_It’s easy to say that._

**I thought using words was important to you.**

Her lips firmed into a thin line. _Words are nice, but they don’t mean much when they don’t match your actions._

**What do you want me to do? What can I do from this far away?**

_You’re a big boy. Figure out something that fixes telling a girl you love her one day and then making her cry the next._

**I made you cry?**

_Yeah, you did._

**I’m sorry.**

_You said that already._

 

 

July 23rd

Halla fought the urge to fiddle with her pen as she looked around the table at the exhibits staff. This was her third weekly staff meeting and as the newest and youngest member of the department she still felt out of place.

“The children’s wing of the museum is overdue for a complete revamp and we need to brainstorm some ideas for new hands on exhibits.” The head of the department looked up from her agenda and scanned the faces gathered around the oval table. “Does anyone have any ideas?”

Halla waited for someone to speak up but everyone was intent on the papers before them on the table. She swallowed and then said, “We could do an exhibit about the different ways we look at the stars now. They are familiar with optical scopes, but we could build models of an Atmospheric Cherekov, or the infrared or radio scopes, or the x-ray scopes. We could bring in a submillimeter model as well. I don’t know how complicated we want to get in our explanations, but all the scopes that work outside the optical spectrum we should be able to model and then explain. We could probably even ask observatories to give us copies of old data output so the children can see what measurements of things we can’t see look like. Children can view the fluctuations in radiation that a pulsar puts out and recognize that rhythm showing up in the data. And we can play with mirrors and let the kids build simple optical scopes as well. We could do a whole display of the different types of optical scopes if we want to keep it simpler.”

“No, I like the big scheme – let’s try and do the whole non-visible spectrum. Start calling labs and seeing if we can get access to data for display purposes and then put together a list of discoveries that each type of scope has been used to make.”

Halla carefully schooled her expression so as to not reveal the excitement racing through her. She wriggled her toes inside her shoes as she jotted down notes of what she needed to do. This was her first big project that she had been given to handle by herself and she was determined to get it right.

“Anyone else?” Margot asked.

 

 

July 25

Chelsea picked up another piskóta from the plate and bit into the crisp cookie with a sigh of happiness. “I can’t believe you found a Hungarian bakery. I have missed these so much!” She dipped it into her coffee and took another bite.

“They had gundel palacsinta too, but we’ll have to go there to get that so they can flambé it for us at the table.”

Chelsea nibbled at the piskóta as she leaned back into the corner of the sofa. “The desserts are the only food I miss.”

Halla laughed. “I think the desserts are the only thing I miss period. That and being your roomie, of course.”

Chelsea waved off the compliment. “Of course. Everyone would miss being my roomie. I’m a delight to live with.”

“Until you start snoring.”

She tossed one of the throw pillows at Halla who grabbed it and placed it behind her back. “Whatever. You’re the snorer.”

“Right. Now, spill.” Halla tucked her feet under her on the little sofa. “How’s your job going?”

Chelsea smiled widely. “Well, Agatha’s no Jenny.”

“I take it by your face that that’s a good thing?”

“Oh, it’s definitely a good thing. She actually,” Chelsea leaned in and whispered conspiratorially, “values my opinion.”

Halla gasped dramatically and clutched her imaginary pearls. “Whatever is this world coming to?”

“I already have my own company credit card and she’s having me put together a look book for a male client who I can’t name but you’ve seen his butt on a big screen before.”

“Well you certainly landed on your feet.”

“And how’s the museum? Everything you hoped for?”

Halla’s face lit up as she sighed happily. “It is pretty wonderful. I was assigned my first big project so I’m excited about that.”

“Then why do you still have sadness in your eyes? Please tell me you’re not moping over Superman still.”

Her smile faded and she stared into her coffee as if she could divine an answer in the dark liquid. “Not moping. Just wondering how I was so wrong about him.”

“Babydoll, you barely knew him.” Chelsea leaned forward and patted Halla’s knee softly. “You’ve spent more time thinking about him than time with him. Sure he’s great in the sack, but you don’t really know anything about him.”

Halla’s spine stiffened. “I do too. We talk a lot.”

Chelsea raised an eyebrow as she sat back against the arm of the sofa. “How religious is he?”

“I’m not sure.” Halla swirled the remains of her coffee in the mug. “I think not very. I mean, he doesn’t talk about it.”

“Okay, what’s his favorite book?”

Halla thought for a moment and tried to remember if she had seen any books out in his house. “Superman comic books?”

“Is that a question?” Chelsea cocked her head to the side and looked over the rim of her glasses at Halla. “Because if it is you don’t know.”

“Fine, I don’t know.” She flipped her hair back out of her face.

“Does he want kids?”

Halla sipped her coffee and then licked her lips. “I think so. I mean, he comes from a big family and seems to have liked that.”

“So he wants a lot of kids.”

“Oh.” Halla listened to her heartbeat growing loud in her ears. “Well, I don’t know for sure.”

“Yeah, and how many do you want?”

Halla set her mug on the table and hugged her knees to her chest. “One? Maybe two if the first one’s cute.”

“Right. Are you starting to see my point?”

Halla twisted her ring around her finger, counting the rotations in her head as a soothing mantra. “I guess so.”

“You spent four months building a fantasy of what this guy is like, and maybe he really is that wonderful, but considering how he treated you, maybe you are a bit delusional if you think this will really work out. I mean, it really is lovely that he’s hung like a horse–,”

Halla’s head snapped up. “I never said that!”

Chelsea laughed. “Hush, let me have my fantasy of what he would look like naked.”

Halla threw the pillow back at her friend. “Oh, you’re horrible.”

Chelsea giggled. “I watched  _The Tudors_ , too, okay. I have an imagination.”

“And a vibe.”

“Of course. Now, back to the point. I love that he can fuck you into the mattress like the man of your wildest dreams…though I guess your wildest dreams take two men, don’t they?

 Halla flushed a bright red and buried her face in her hands. “I’m going to regret telling you that forever.”

“Right. The point is, sex is super, but there’s got to be more to a relationship that shagging, even if it is fantastic shagging.”

“Fine.” Halla rolled her eyes and threw up her hands in surrender. “But don’t even  _think_  about setting me up on blind dates.”

“Not even with Mr. Big Screen Naked Butt?” Chelsea coaxed.

Halla gnawed on her bottom lip as she thought for a moment. “Well, maybe him.”

 

 

July 27

Henry:  **Hey, Barbie. How’s London treating you?**

Halla:  _Wonderfully. The weather’s gorgeous, I have my first big project at work, and I’m going to a concert in the park this evening._

**It sounds like you’re having a great time.**

_I am. How’s filming going?_

**Really well. We’ve been doing a lot of stunt work this week which I love but it’s exhausting.**

Halla’s eyes scrunched shut as she contemplated what Chelsea had said to her. Holding her breath, she typed,  _Can I ask a really weird question?_

**Sure.**

_How many kids do you want?_ Her entire body tensed up as she waited for an answer, and she found herself worrying her bottom lip with her teeth.

**Five.**

Halla’s stomach plummeted past her knees which suddenly felt like jelly.  _Wow. You better plan on paying your nanny extra._

**I won’t have a nanny. My mom raised five kids without a nanny. My wife won’t need one either.**

Halla felt a wave of sympathy for Henry’s future wife in a giant house full of white carpeting, floor to ceiling windows everywhere and multiple drowning hazards.  _Well, good luck with that. One more weird question?_

**Sure.**

_Are Sundays your only day off?_

**I’m off on the weekend usually, why?**

_You only text me on Sundays and I was wondering if it was because you were bored on Sundays._

**I’m busy the rest of the week with filming.**

Halla didn’t think it was possible to be so busy that you didn’t have time to text hello, but knew it wasn’t worth the fight.  _Right. Well, I need to go get ready for the concert. I’ll talk to you next Sunday I guess._

 

 

August 1

Halla was searching through her email for the contact information of the head of that research lab in Norway that she could never remember the name of when her mobile rang. She answered it without looking at the display.

“Hello?”

“Sassy!” The familiar Irish accent tickled against her ear.

“What’s up, Michael?”

“Do you want to go get some popcorn?”

Halla stopped sorting through her email and sat back in her chair. “Popcorn?”

“Yes. James and I were going to go to a premiere this evening but Anne-Marie’s sick and he doesn’t want to leave her home with the kids when she’s not feeling well, and I was wondering if you wanted to go eat fancy popcorn with me so I’m not a loner.”

Halla scoffed. “Oh, so I’m your backup plan. Very nice, Fassbender.”

“It’s not like that.”

“How is it then?”

There was a short pause. “Well, it’s kind of like that. But just think – fancy popcorn.”

Halla looked at the clock and at the unread count on her email inbox which chose that moment to flip to a higher number. “When is this thing?”

“Tonight, film is at eight. We should probably be there by seven.”

Her jaw dropped. “Michael, it’s three in the afternoon.”

“Yeah? That’s four hours to get ready.”

She rubbed her hand across her forehead. It was impossible that he was this clueless. He’d had girlfriends before. “I don’t even have a dress.”

“Just pick something from your closet. You always looked nice.”

“There’s a difference between work clothes and movie premiere clothes.”

“You’ll be lovely. Come rescue me from being lonely, please?”

She could practically hear the puppy dog eyes. “God, you’re so needy. Fine, I’ll go. But you better pick me up in a nice car. And get me refills on my popcorn without whinging about it.”

“Deal.”

She gave him her direction and ended the call only to quickly ring Chelsea. “I need your help.”

“What’s up, buttercup?”

She ran a hand across her face. “I’m going to a premiere tonight and I have nothing to wear.”

There was an almost unnoticeable pause before Chelsea answered. “Is Henry in town?”

“No need to sound so suspicious, Chelz. It’s with someone else.”

“Okay, then I’ll help you out. Come on over and I’ll find you something stunning.”

“And pink.”

“No. You wear too much pink. You’re going to wear something else.” Halla blinked in surprise. Chelsea sounded like Cruella de Ville.

“But I like pink.”

“But they’re my dresses.”

Halla knew when she had been beaten. “Bitch.”

“You know it,” Chelsea responded cheerily. “Stay sweet, parakeet.”

Halla left work an hour early and headed over to the offices of Agatha Jasper. Chelsea met her right inside the door. “Who are you going to the premiere with?” she whispered.

“Michael Fassbender.”

“Oh good, he’s big enough to count. Come with me.” She dragged Halla down a hall and knocked on a closed door.

“Come on in!”

Chelsea opened the door. “Hi Agatha. This is my friend Halla. She’s going with Michael Fassbender to a movie premiere tonight and needs a dress.” Chelsea looked Halla up and down. “Actually, she needs a whole makeover. Do you mind if I do her as practice?”

“Go ahead.” Agatha turned her attention to Halla. “Make sure you stand on the carpet with him and smile pretty for the cameras, and keep some of my cards in your handbag.”

“I will. Thank you for saving me at the last minute.”

“Just don’t sweat on the dress or lose the sparkles.”

“I won’t.”

They both murmured their thanks and Chelsea issued her out of the office and shut the door behind her with a giggle. “Let’s go find you something.”

Five dresses later Halla stepped out of her dressing room again and stood in front of the array of mirrors.

“Oh, that’s it!” Chelsea exclaimed.

Halla looked down at the little wisp of a dress. The Prussian blue filmy fabric was lined with a silk the same shade and beaded in an angular art deco pattern. It ended in a swirl a few inches above her knees. “Really?” The thin straps and deep vee neckline left her feeling bare.

“Absolutely. Echoes of Daisy Buchanan in the Great Gatsby, especially with your coloring. Ooooh, that gives me an idea.” She went running out of the room and came back with a large feather brooch made out of diamonds. “We’re going to curl your hair and pin it up into a loose chignon so we don’t go too literal with the Gatsby, and then we’ll pin this into the curls.

“I can’t wear that!”

“Why not?”

“That’s got to be millions of dollars of diamonds.”

“Oh no, it’s fake. Good fake, though, right?”

Halla bent closer to examine it. “It really is.”

“Don’t worry though,” Chelsea grinned like a Cheshire cat, “the earrings are real.”

Two hours later, curled, pinned, rouged, plumped and primped within an inch of her life, Halla put in the dangling diamond earrings that Chelsea had insisted she wear and fastened the buckles on the delicate t-strap high heels. At precisely six thirty there was a knock on the door. She took one more deep breath, smoothed down the front of her dress and opened the door.

Fassy’s eyebrows rose as he looked her up and down. “If this is you not having anything to wear, I’m going to feel considerably less bad about calling you up last minute in the future.”

Halla patted her hair, making sure all the curls were behaving. “You don’t look too bad yourself, but considering all you had to do was put on a black suit and a white shirt, that’s considerably less impressive.”

“Hey, I found matching socks all by myself.”

She smiled as she brushed her fingers against his chin. “And you even shaved. Herculean labors indeed.” She picked up the little black sequined handbag from the table and checked to make sure she had her mobile, credit card, cash, and her lipstick. “Meanwhile, I called in a favor from a friend to get this dress, I have been instructed that I am not allowed to sweat tonight, I have to stand next to you and get photographed while smiling attractively, and I have the names of the designers of the dress, shoes, earrings, handbag, and the brooch in my hair running around in my head in case anyone asks. I’ve been practicing them so I don’t say them wrong.”

Fassy laughed. “I love women, but I am so glad I am not one. Do you want a coat before we go?”

“No. If I stay cold then I won’t sweat.”

Fassy shook his head. “Get a coat.”

“It’s August. I’m fine. And if I get cold I’ll steal your jacket.”

“Right. Let’s go then.”

When they were in the car which smelled like it had been freshly cleaned, Halla asked, “So what film are we seeing tonight?”

“It’s called  _The Hundred Foot Journey._ ”

“What’s it about?”

Michael shrugged. “Someone who’s really slow?”

Halla snorted and pushed his arm playfully. “No, really, what’s it about?”

“I don’t know. I try and stay as uninformed about films as possible so I don’t go in with any preconceived notions. It’s got Helen Mirren in it though.”

“Oh, well then we’ll be fine. I want to be Helen Mirren when I grow up.”

Fassy shook his head. “No, I get to be Helen Mirren.”

Her tongue ticked against the roof of her mouth. “Why do you get dibs on Mirren?”

“Because we’re both actors. You can be…Hubble.”

Halla watched him for a few seconds before she responded. “You’re really hoping that telescope is named after a person and isn’t an acronym right now, aren’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Well you’re lucky.” Halla paused and looked at him out of the corner of her eyes. “Okay, you can be Helen Mirren if I can be Maggie Smith.”

“Oh, that’s a good choice too. Maybe I want to be her. She is the Dowager Countess, after all.”

Halla turned in her seat so she was facing him. “ _You_  watch Downton?”

“Shhh, it’s my guilty pleasure.”

She giggled and clapped her palms together repeatedly. “Oh my god, did you cry when Sybil died?”

“No. I’m a man. I don’t cry.”

She prodded him in the arm. “You totally cried.”

“Shut up.”

She laughed and poked him again. “You’re a crier. Admit it.”

“Fine. I cried.  _A little._  Are you happy?”

She clasped her hands together over her heart. “Yes. Your tears are a source of joy to me.”

He shook his head. “You look all sweet and innocent, but you’re heartless aren’t you?”

“I’m as cold and empty as the vacuum of space,” she bragged.

“Wow. That would almost be poetic if it wasn’t so terrifying knowing I’m going to be sitting next to you in a dark cinema for two hours this evening.”

“Feed me popcorn and you will be safe.”

“Like you’re some ancient inscrutable god and I must sacrifice to you to be protected?”

She laughed again. “Pretty much. Food always works though. As long as you keep my belly full, I’m pretty harmless.”

“I’ll remember that.”

They spent the rest of the drive discussing their hopes for the fifth season of Downton Abbey and soon they were getting ready to smile for the array of photographers. Halla looked up at Michael. “I think I’m going to be ill.”

“You’re going to be fine. You just have to stand there and look pretty, so you don’t have anything to worry about.”

Halla’s cheeks flushed a pale rose. “I’m going to trip over my own feet.”

“Just think, ‘What would Helen Mirren do?”

“I thought I was Maggie Smith.”

“No, I’m Maggie Smith, you’re Helen Mirren.”

“Fine.” Halla took a deep breath and imagined Helen Mirren. Her chin came up and her shoulders back and she opened her eyes and looked up at Michael calmly. She slipped her hand into his. “Let’s do this.”

Michael looked over at her partway through the onslaught of flashbulbs. She stood with perfect poise at his side, a natural looking smile on her face. He bent his head to hers and whispered, “You’re a natural at this.”

She looked up at him with a grin on her face and cupped his chin so she could whisper in his ear without him moving. “Of course I’m a natural at this. I’m Helen fucking Mirren. I am a goddess.”

He pulled back to look at her. “A goddess, indeed.”

“Stop looking at me and look at the cameras, Maggie.”

He did what he was told.

Once off the carpet and into the event they ate curry served in tiny bowls made of naan, frog legs, beef bourguignon on skewers, caviar with crème fraiche served on blinis, veggie samosas, and little aloo gobi cakes that were fried like latke as they circulated among all the other attendees. Michael introduced Halla to everyone who stopped to talk and she noticed several of the men giving Michael speculative looks which he would return with a slight shake of his head. She finally asked what was going on.

Michael scratched at his chin as if he still had a beard. “They are wondering if you’re available.”

“And you’re telling them no?”

His head tilted slightly as he looked at her in confusion. “Of course.”

“Why? Some of those guys were cute!” She turned to look for the tall blond man who had just left.

Amusement sparkled in Michael’s eyes. “They’re not wanting to date you, they’re wanting to pay you.”

It took a second for Halla to process that and then her mouth fell open as she crossed her arm across her chest, grabbing her shoulder. “They think I’m a hooker?”

“No, they think you’re a very high priced escort.”

She scowled at him. “I’m not sure that is much of an improvement.”

“It means they think you’re gorgeous and sexy.”

“And for sale!” Her eyes narrowed as a thought burst forth like Athena from the brow of Zeus. “Do you hire call girls regularly?”

“No!”

She was not placated by his adamant denial. “Then why do they think you would be with a call girl?”

He held up his hands to her, his palms out as if he were trying to calm a wild animal. “It’s not uncommon for men to pick up an escort for a night like this.”

“Oh great. So all these people around here think I’m your paid company. That’s lovely.” Anger and embarrassment warred within her, leaving her sick to her stomach and ready to leave.

“Halla, anyone who sees the photos from the carpet will know that you’re not an escort. They never go in front of the cameras.”

Her nails bit into her palms as she breathed noisily through her nose. “Well let’s hope everyone sees the pictures then.”

Michael watched her fume for a moment. “Can I get you something more to eat?”

The tentativeness in his voice instead of his usual sarcasm pricked at her sense of humor. “Trying to placate the angry god?”

He smiled briefly. “Possibly.”

Halla scowled and then took a deep breath and let it out. Her shoulders slowly returned to their normal altitude. “I could fancy another samosa I suppose. Or two.”

They finally made their way into the theatre and were handed beautiful open topped dessert boxes and cold glasses filled with fruit colored beverages.

“This is not popcorn,” Halla whispered to Michael as they made their way to their seats.

“Maybe it’s better than popcorn.”

“Irrelevant. You promised me popcorn.”

“We can stop on the way home and get you popcorn if you still want popcorn.”

“I guess that’s acceptable.”

They took their seats and Halla started examining the contents of her box. There was an assortment of macarons, a chocolate crème puff, several different  _pâtes de fruits_ , sandesh in the shape of conch-shells and elephants, fried modak, and a small bowl full of gulab jamun. She looked over at Michael. “This might be better than popcorn.”

“Try the little fried ball thingies,” he muttered, his mouth already full. Halla picked up one of the gulab jamun and popped it in her mouth. “Oh my,” she murmured before she licked the sticky syrup from her fingers. “Definitely better than popcorn.

“What are the drinks?”

She picked hers up and sniffed it. “Mango lassi from the smell of it.”

He picked up his and tasted it. “I think mine’s strawberry.”

“Mind if I trade you? I’m allergic to mango.”

 “That’s an odd allergy.”

“I discovered it when I was eight and ate a bunch of pistachios. It’s a shared allergy; cashews, pistachios, mangos, and papaya.”

“Do you get anaphylactic? Do you have a needle somewhere for me to stab you with?”

She giggled. “No, I just get a really nasty rash. And then I get cranky.”

He swapped glasses with her. “Well, let’s keep you from getting cranky.”

The lights dimmed and they settled back into their seats. The story unfolded of a small Indian restaurant and its rivalry with a three-Michelin-star French restaurant one hundred feet away. The odd combination of foods they had been eating all evening finally made sense. Thirty minutes into the movie, Fassy noticed Halla shiver.

“Are you cold?”

“This theatre is freezing,” she hissed.

He leaned forward enough to shed his jacket and then draped it over her. She immediately grabbed the lapel and pulled it up to her chin with both hands. Michael placed his arm around her shoulders and she leaned into him, leeching his warmth into her body. “Better?” he whispered and she smiled at him and nodded. “Good.”

Halla could smell him on the coat, his cologne and a faint whiff of cigarette smoke and whatever else it was that made up the scent that was uniquely his. It brought back the memories of their few months together and how much she had enjoyed being with him, even if the job hadn’t been her favorite. The memory of him holding her hand through the last film when she had been scared raced through her mind and she could feel the soothing stroke of his thumb against her skin again, even if only in her imagination. The film became background noise for her as she carefully went through her memories of their time together.

He had always been thoughtful and accommodating, letting her schedule her errands for him around her need to attend meetings on a regular basis. He’d never made her feel like she inconvenienced him and their banter had always bordered on flirtatious but she had never let those thoughts enter her mind because he was her boss. Except he wasn’t her boss now and he was kind and encouraging and believed in her dreams.

She darted a glance at him and he was entranced by the film. She tried to imagine what that night on the balcony in Rotterdam would have been like if he hadn’t been her boss. Would even her lingering romantic hopes for Henry have kept her from taking Michael up on the definite offer of a real relationship? A wave of understanding for Henry swept through her as she realized how insane her holding on to the wisp of a dream of being an astrophysicist must seem to someone who was offering her a concrete reality, only to have it rejected.

She watched the screen mindlessly as her memories played back in her head in higher definition that the film in front of her. The way he looked when he woke in the morning, his sleepy smile when he saw her, and the way his body moved as he stretched first thing in the morning. She flashed back over the countless times she had straightened his tie for him and the brush of his fingers against hers when she handed him his coffee. He obviously could function without an assistant since he hadn’t replaced her. She looked at him again as she wondered why, if he missed having an assistant, he hadn’t gotten a new one. A fanciful part of her brain whispered that it was because he didn’t want to replace her.

Was Michael still harboring hopes for her? He hadn’t mentioned anything when they had met for coffee that day. Just that he hoped that they could still be friends. She played over that conversation in her head and paused on his comment that her heart was still with Henry. She darted another glance at him. Was he waiting for her to get over Henry, or at least make a decision one way or another? This shark of a man who went after anything he wanted with no hesitation, was he really treading water waiting for her to make up her mind one way or another?

He knew practically everyone here. Even without bringing someone he wouldn’t have been alone. Halla was certain that there many prettier women than her who would have gladly accompanied him tonight, yet he had called her. A fluttering lightness perched in her chest. He had called her. Even knowing how screwed up she was he had called her. She was sitting next to a gorgeous, talented, funny, smart man who knew what a mess she had made of her life, still believed in her, and wanted to be with her, even if only as a friend, and somehow she had missed much of that in her fascination with Henry. Hell, she had even told Henry during that confusing morning in Rotterdam that if he hadn’t been her boss and had asked her out, she would have said yes.

Was she over Henry? He was so many of the things that Michael was, and yet she seemed to be welcome in his life only when she wasn’t inconvenient. For as much time as they spent together, she didn’t know much about his plans for his future, but if he was really set on five kids, there were significant differences between her plans and his. She was sitting next to someone that could possibly be part of her future, and was she really going to toss it away in favor of moping like a teenager? She could easily see her and Michael rating films by how good the treats were at the premiere and him teaching her about old movies that inspired him to be an actor, and her making him watch  _Star Trek_ episodes and explaining how that show had shaped her dreams for the future, and he would never really be a Trekkie but he would respect if because of how much it meant to her. And then they would watch  _Downton Abbey_  together and she would tease him about crying and he would insist he was allergic to her new perfume and then they would miss the last half of the episode because they would be busy kissing.

Halla sighed softly. That was one thing she wouldn’t have to worry about. She already knew he was a good kisser; she’d practically flung her knickers at his head on that balcony. And now it wouldn’t just be about being kissed by anyone, it would be him kissing her, and her kissing him back because she wanted to kiss  _him_. Did she want to kiss him? She did. Somewhere between reading chapters of the book he had gotten her every night and arguing with him over who got to be Maggie Smith and sitting here under his coat she had realized that she wasn’t going to let waiting for Henry to fix things keep her from pursuing other options. She had walked away from Henry to pursue one dream for her future. Maybe she had walked away from him in pursuit of another dream at the same time.

The light flutter in her chest sank into her stomach and splashed about as she thought about what she should do about it. How do you let a guy know that you’re ready for him to ask you out? Of course, you could just ask him out yourself with all the potential humiliation that entailed. She gave herself a little pep talk and then, exerting all of her courage, she flipped up the arm rest between their seats and waited.

Nothing happened.

She glanced at Michael only to see that he was still watching the film as if nothing happened. He hadn’t even tightened his arm around her shoulders.

Her eyes narrowed. She scooted in closer to his side so their legs were pressed against each other.

He adjusted the position of his arm around her to a more comfortable position.

Again she waited but nothing else happened.

With a mental  _once more into the breach_  she rested her head against his shoulder. Her eyes closed in relief as she felt his lips brush against her forehead. He slipped his hand inside the coat and let it rest against her arm. She mostly managed to pay attention to the rest of the film, though she did find herself frequently distracted by the feel of Michael’s breathing.

His jacket was comically large on her as they walked back to the car but Michael stopped to find her hand in the recesses of the sleeve so he could hold it and sought it out again once they were back on the road. They talked about the film as they drove, both reticent to discuss what had happened during it. He walked her up to her flat and she paused at the door, still holding his hand.

“What are you doing Sunday night?” he asked.

“Wow, two whole days notice this time. I feel special.” She looked down at their linked hands. “Ummm, nothing that I know of. Is James standing you up again?” She didn’t want to read too much into him inquiring about her schedule.

“I was wondering if you wanted to go to dinner with me.”

She looked back up at him as she fought back the excitement she was feeling like bubbles popping against her skin. “Like on a date?”

He placed his free hand against the door next to her head. She leaned back against the door and he leaned in closer to her. “Yes, Sassy,” his eyes flashed as he smiled at her, “will you go on a date with me?”

She smiled back, feeling the flutters take up residence in her heart again. “I will.”

He let go of her hand to cup her face as he bent to kiss her. Halla held her breath in expectation as his lips brushed lightly against hers. His mouth was warm and soft as he kissed her once, twice, and again before he pulled back to let his fingers trail along her jaw. The sensation made her shiver from head to toe and she let out her breath in a single surprised gasp.

“I’ll ring you once I make a reservation.”

She nodded and turned around to fumble the key out of her handbag and into the lock. She let herself in and turned to say goodnight. She slipped off his coat and handed it to him. “Thank you for a wonderful evening, although there was an appalling lack of popcorn.”

He took the jacket from her, letting his hand rub against hers. “You’re welcome. Thanks for filling in at the last minute.”

He kissed her once more, and Halla felt her lips parting as she rested her hands against his chest. His heart beat steadily under her palm as hers cavorted wildly in her chest. The languid kiss melted into her bones and as he tugged at her bottom lip with his teeth her entire body was washed in the fiery wake of a phoenix’s conflagration.

He stepped back and smiled once more as he pressed her mouth shut with a finger under her chin. Halla shook her head slightly to snap her out of her trance and then put the back of her fingers to her scorching cheeks.

She started to shut the door, but stopped when he said, “You’d be wasted as an escort.”

She looked at him in confusion. Was that an insult or a compliment?

“There isn’t enough money in the world to pay the value of a minute’s conversation with you.”

Her mouth dropped open again and he winked at her, blew her a kiss, and turned on his heel. She stuck her head out her door to watch him walk back down the hall. It was more of a swagger, she decided, as he shrugged his coat back on. She slowly shook her head in confused wonder and shut the door.

 


	28. Chapter Twenty-seven

August 2

Halla woke to the buzzing of her mobile. She picked it up and squinted at the screen. Who in the hell was texting her at six in the morning? She flicked open the message. A photo of the Horsehead Nebula. What?

She sat up and blinked a few times. Why was Henry sending her a photo of the Horsehead Nebula at six in the morning? Well, it was ten at night his time, not that it made any more sense for him to be sending her pictures of celestial objects on a Friday night, either. She was about to ask him what he was doing when another picture popped up. This time it was of M16, better known as the Pillars of Creation.

_Why are you sending me pictures of outer space?_

**I took them. I thought you might like to see them.**

_Superman, you need to tell them to leave the funny mushrooms off your pizza next time._

**Really, I took the pictures.**

_You cannot actually fly in outer space. Did you fall out of your stunt harness and hit your head?_

A minute or so later another picture popped up. Halla’s eyes widened at the distinctive orange stripe on the telescope. Where had he gotten a hold of a Celestron?

_Where are you?_

**At my house.**

Curiouser and curiouser.  _Why do you have that telescope?_

**I bought it. You said I should get a telescope, so I did.**

Halla scratched at her hair. It must be nice to be rich.  _That’s a professional grade telescope. That thing probably weighs more than you do._

**Well, you’re going to be an astrophysicist. I thought you should have a good one in case you ever visit again.**

Halla’s heart was a half-fledged bird. He believed in her. That’s what she had wanted, right? That scope showed it wasn’t just idle words. He was spending his Friday night looking at galaxies because of her. And she could use it too, if, when, if she went to see him again. She wanted to soar on those thoughts, but knew she couldn’t. Her being an astrophysicist wasn’t something that could be satisfied with a telescope at home, no matter how nice it was.  _That’s not just a good telescope. That’s a_ great  _telescope. That’s nicer than anything I’ve ever hoped of personally owning._

**You told me that I needed to do more than just say I was sorry. Well, this is me showing you that I believe you’re going to succeed. I was an ass about your dreams. When I was Fat Cavill a lot of people told me I would never be an actor. I never thought I would be one of those people to someone else and yet I was. And to make it even worse, it was to you.**

_You really hurt me._

Her phone rang.

“Hello.”

“I’ll never forgive myself for hurting you.”

She curled up with the phone against her ear and closed her eyes. His voice was so sad. “It’s hard for me to remember how wonderful the rest of our holiday was because of that fight. It’s like you’re wonderful until something doesn’t go your way and then you refuse to deal with it.”

“I didn’t realize how much this meant to you.”

Halla sighed, blowing air up over her face. “Why not? I  _told_  you how much it meant to me.”

“I didn’t understand.” Halla waited for him to explain himself. How could he not understand the words she had said to him? “You were so different when we met. Soaking wet in the rain with no clue who you were or what you wanted to do. And I think part of me still sees you like that, because that night was when I started falling for you. You were funny and sweet and nerdy and adorable, and you still are all those things, but now you’re out to conquer the world and I’m not sure what to do with that part.”

“Well, you need to figure it out, because that’s who I am. I’m happy like this. I’m happy trying to conquer the world and even if I never make it I’ll be happier knowing that I’ve tried.”

There was a long silence. “Am I supposed to wait for you?” He sounded so lost and her half-fledged heart wanted to wrap its wings around his voice and jump, trusting him to keep her from hurting herself.

“What if I make it though? Waiting for me makes it sounds like I’m going to stop at some point and I don’t want to stop.”

“Don’t you want kids?”

Halla rolled over onto her back and stared at the ceiling in the slowly increasing light. “One, maybe two. But even then I’m don’t want to stay home and clean their sticky hand prints off of your huge windows and spend their younger years worrying if they’ve fallen into the swimming pool and their older years worrying if they’re knocking someone up in the hot tub.”

She heard a huff of laughter come across the line. “You sound like you’ve thought about this a lot.”

“I have. And I don’t want five kids and I don’t want to be a stay at home mom and I don’t want to raise my kids in the States and we’re just so different.” She took a breath and forced herself to say the words she knew were true. “We’re better off just staying a holiday fling.” They tore at her throat and left acid in her mouth.

“But I love you.”

She could hear him fighting not to cry which only made it hurt worse. “You love _parts_ of me. And I,” she sighed and closed her eyes and finally admitted it, “I love  _parts_  of you. But I want the whole deal, and you deserve someone who’s going to love all of you, who’s going to give you all those curly headed babies you want.”

There was silence for several seconds and she heard him rub his hand across his face. “Is there someone else?”

“This isn’t about me picking someone else over you. This is about me facing reality instead of hiding from it or running away. As much as we want each other, we also want different things.”

“I can change.”

She wondered how people who kicked puppies didn’t just fall over and instantly die from the guilt and pain. “I don’t want you to change. I want you to find the person whose right for you. I’m not, and you’ll realize that.”

The sound of him swallowing. “So this is it, then.”

She could imagine him, his jaw setting into the firm square but with the pain dulling his eyes. “I think it is.”

“I’ll miss you, Barbie.”

She sniffed a few times as the first tears spilled over onto her cheeks. “Keep in touch, Superman. And when you’re back in London, let me know and we’ll watch some Babylon 5.”

“I will. And Halla, if you find the new Krypton home world out there, let me know, will you?”

“You’ll be the first person I call.” She could barely get the words out around the pain damming the tears in her throat.

They listened to each other breathe until Halla finally pressed the red end button. She put her mobile back down on her bedside table, wrapped her arms around her pillow, and wept.

Around two she rang Chelsea. She didn’t bother with any niceties but plunged into the deep philosophical questions. “Why does it hurt to do the right thing?”

“What happened, babe?”

“Henry texted me this morning and then rang me and we talked and I told him it was never going to work and it hurts. He was like 80 percent perfect and that eighty percent was so perfectly perfect that I wanted it to just kind of overflow and fill in the 20 percent that wasn’t, but it won’t.” She didn’t cry and she wasn’t sure if it was because she was doing better or if she was dehydrated.

“Normally I would bring booze. What do you want instead of a bottle of vodka?”

“Ice  cream.” She thought for a moment. “And chocolate éclairs.”

“I’ll be right over.”

That evening her phone rang. Halla fumbled for the glowing rectangle in the darkness and hit the answer button and rested it on her forehead and the tip of her nose. “Hello?”

“Hey, Sassy. What are you up to this evening?”

“Currently I am staring at my mobile which I am balancing on my face in a daring display of kinesthetic intelligence. Before that I was staring at the stars on my ceiling.”

“Those both seem like, um, odd choices for a Saturday evening.”

“Well, I was just laying on my bed in the dark regretting my choice to eat my own body weight in éclairs and contemplating the wisdom of my other life choices, and I figured if I was going to walk that road, I might as well look at something pretty while I was doing it, so I turned on my night sky projector and was staring at Orion’s belt. Did you know that’s actually part of a galaxy but we can’t really see it with the bare eye?”

“I did not know that.” There was a long pause as Halla crossed her eyes, trying to see if she could make her phone disappear. “How long have you been lying on your bed in the dark?”

“What time is it?” She scrunched her eyes shut, trying to get them to stop hurting.

“Around seven.”

“Well, Chelsea left around five, so that would be about two hours then.” She kept her eyes closed, enjoying the magical star display she created by pushing on her closed eyelids.

“Put some clothes on, I’m coming over.”

“Don’t doooo that.”

The call had already ended.

About half an hour later there was a knock at the door. She opened it to find Michael standing there in black jeans, a black tee, and black leather jacket. “Why are you dressed up as Batman?”

“Why are  _you_  in your pyjamas? I told you to put clothes on.”

She looked down at her  _Battlestar Gallactica_ flight suit. “These are clothes.”

Michael shook his head. “Put clothes on you can leave your flat in.”

“I can leave my flat in these.”

He folded his arms across his chest and leaned against the door frame.

“Fine. I’ll go put  _other_ clothes on.” She walked into her bedroom and then yelled, “but I could totally go outside in these if I wanted to.”

She came back out a few minutes later in a tee and jeans and zipping up a dark hoodie with the  _Star Trek_ logo on it. She stopped in front of Michael. “Better?”

“Yes, come on.”

“Where are we going?” She grabbed her small messenger bag style purse and slung it across her body.

“Out. You’re not spending any more time staring at your ceiling in the dark.”

They walked down the steps and Halla stopped on the pavement when he opened the saddlebag on a large motorcycle parked right in front of her building. He pulled out a motorcycle helmet and handed it to her. “Really?”

He nodded. “Really. You ride, you wear a helmet.”

“What if I don’t want to ride?”

He grinned at her. “But you do. You’re not very good at hiding your emotions and I saw the smile that flashed over your face. Now put the helmet on and we’ll go ride until we outrun whatever it is that has you hiding in your room in a funk and acting like a fifteen year old..”

“I wasn’t hiding,” she muttered as she took the helmet and put it on. He straddled the bike and then helped her on behind him. A voice came through her helmet. “Have you ridden before?”

“Yep.”

“Alright. Remember, don’t hold on too tight and try and lean with me.”

Halla let Michael’s body shelter her from the wind and rested her head against his back as she kept her arms loosely linked around his waist. London traffic slowly gave way to more rural views. She could tell they were heading south, but other than that she didn’t know where they were going and frankly she didn’t care. It was nice to be out and not having to think about Henry, except she couldn’t stop thinking about that conversation she had had this morning, and how much heartache could have been avoided if she had known more about him before she had gotten romantically involved.

This moment here, on the back of Michael’s bike, with him all warm and solid to hold on to, and the steady vibration of the engine between her legs was really nice, but it would have been nice with any decent guy. This was about an experience and not about Michael. Sometimes she really wished she was a bonobo and didn’t have to worry about all this relationship and compatibility junk. Unwilling to jump from the frying pan and into the fire, she decided to ask Michael about the issues that had broken up her and Henry.

“Can I ask you something completely inappropriate at this point in whatever the word for whatever it is we have is? Because honestly, I’m not even sure if this counts as a date and if it did what number this really would be because I’ve kicked you out of bed and you’ve seen me in the shower and we’ve kissed before I –,”

Michael’s laughter came ringing through the headset built into the helmet. “Ask anything you want, Halla.”

She scrunched up her nose. “Do you want kids?” she squeaked.

Her question was met with more laughter. “Is that it? With that buildup I thought it was going to be much worse.” He paused for a few seconds. “Eventually. I’d like to have one or two. I’m not ready yet, though. My career’s where I’m focusing right now. How about you?

“The same.”

“So, umm, why are you bringing this up now, Sassy?”

“You are soooo the wrong person to be talking to this about.”

“You can talk to me about anything. That’s a pretty good test for a relationship. Can you actually talk to the person? So how many does Henry want?”

Halla smiled at how easily he understood what was running through her head. “Five. And a stay at home wife. It’s like, you think there would be a basic compatibility test by now, like you could put in what you want and then like, some microchip would set off a warning alarm when you got too close to someone who doesn’t match you. Or it would turn off your pheromone receptors or something.

His laughter filled her helmet again. “Isn’t that online dating?”

“Or  _Gattaca_.”

“That was a good movie.”

Halla wondered if there was a movie this man hadn’t seen. “So like if you want a bunch of kids or a stay at home wife or think I’m going to get over my obsession with space and am going to give up on being a astrophysicist or anything like that I would like to know now so I can jump off this motorbike before things gets any more complicated and I spend anymore Saturday afternoons eating my feelings.”

He ran his hand along her knee. “We’re fine in that regard.”

“Do you have deal breakers?”

He squeezed her knee before he put his hand back on the handlebars. “None that you violate.”

Halla nodded, feeling off balance with the heavy helmet. “Alright then. I’ll be quiet then and enjoy the moment now instead of worrying about the future.”

“Are you a worrier? I thought the AA thing was all about one day at a time.”

“Not a worrier as much as I’m a planner. And a bit of a perfectionist. I either do it perfectly or don’t do it at all. It’s when I know I’m screwing up and can’t quit for some reason that things get messy.

His hand closed over hers for a moment and he squeezed them. “Is that what started you drinking heavily?”

She shrugged uncomfortably. “Part of it. That fellowship was the hardest thing I’ve ever done, and I was scared, and I made a mistake one day and I got drunk to forget about it, and that sort of set up a cycle. Embarrass yourself, get drunk, more likely to embarrass yourself. After a while you just get drunk as a preventative measure. I would start drinking at breakfast so I could get the courage to walk into the lab again.”

Halla watched the road pass under her feet as the light started to fade. She turned her head so she could watch the sun sink into the horizon. The orb had fragmented into lines against the low lying clouds and was ceding the sky to the night when the speaker in her helmet crackled on again.

“You don’t have to be perfect to be perfect for someone.”

“I know.”

“Do you? Because I don’t want you thinking you have to be perfect.”

Halla loosened her arms and sat back from him. “Really? The one time I messed up you didn’t handle it well. At all. If I may be so bold you handled it in pretty spectacularly awful fashion.”

“I did. And I was bizarrely jealous and thought you had screwed up my schedule because you weren’t paying attention to it because you were sleeping with Henry and then Dom whispering things in your ear that were making you blush and I was an arse and hopefully you’ll forgive me some day because I am so sorry. Even more sorry if what I did contributed to you drinking that night.”

“Why were you so jealous anyway? It’s not like we had been dating or anything.”

“Because you’d been hanging out with me for the previous two months and I’d sort of gotten to thinking of you as mine even though you weren’t. And in pops this big hunk of man meat and starts nosing around my woman.”

Halla laughed and snuggled back into him. “You’re such a caveman,” she teased.

“I know.” He made several grunting noises. “But inside I knew I couldn’t do anything with you because you were my assistant, but I still wanted to, and I was an arse. But you’re not my assistant anymore, and I think I’ve made my intentions clear this time–,”

“I believe you definitely have–,”

“And you seem to be entertaining the possibility of reciprocating those intentions.”

“I believe I am.”

“So, as I believe you told me once, I am concentrating on being less of a fuckweed.” He sounded so proud of himself for diminishing his fuckweediness that she found herself laughing again.

The silence was comfortable and anonymous as the only light was cast by the moon and the lights on the motorcycle. “Do you want to hear something really dumb?”

“Sure.”

“I kept the wrapper from my one day cupcake. I flattened it out and it’s in my journal.”

“I don’t think that’s dumb.”

“Yeah, well, you’re a caveman, so what do you know.” He grunted again and Halla shivered as she wondered what he sounded like during sex. “Shouldn’t we be heading back now that it’s getting dark?”

“No, I’ve actually been waiting for it to get dark before we stopped.”

Halla looked around at the empty farmland. “Where are we going?”

“Leith Hill.”

“Why? It will be closed.”

“If you’re going to stare at stars, you’re going to stare at real ones. We won’t be able to climb the tower, but it will be dark and the highest point in southern England so I thought we would get a good view.”

Halla’s heart squished a bit at the thoughtfulness but she felt odd about thanking him for rescuing her from pity party in such a lovely way. “You’re going to murder me and leave my body for the crows and wild dogs, aren’t you?”

He shook his head slightly. “I don’t think there are wild dogs in this part of England.”

She snorted. “That’s really comforting.”

A few minutes later he pulled the bike into the Leith Hill car park. He killed the motor on the bike and helped Halla off. She handed him her helmet as she waited for her legs to stop vibrating and looked up at the sky.

“Which one is Orion?” Michael asked.

Halla’s forehead rose. He didn’t know how to identify Orion. “Really?”

“Yes. I can find the Big Dipper and that’s about it.”

Halla reminded herself that she was a nerd and not all people were obsessed with space. “Well, I hate to disappoint you but you can’t see Orion right now.”

“Why not?”

“Because it’s August?” She wondered if she should explain orbital paths and the seasons. “He’ll be visible right before sunrise.”

“Alright, then what is up there right now?”

Halla looked north and said, “Well, there’s the Big Dipper,” she pointed and Michael rotated to find it.

“Right, got it.”

“Okay, now if you draw a line through the two outer stars in the cup and extend it that way, the bright star it points to is Polaris or the north star.”

“Wait, which two stars?”

She stepped in front of him. “See the cup?” She outlined it with her finger.

“Right.”

“Now, take the two stars that form the far side of the cup and draw a line through them,” she demonstrated, “and keep going and you’ll run into that really bright star.”

“Oh, so that’s the North Star?”

“Yes, it’s also the tail of Ursa Minor or the Little Dipper.”

“How?”

She etched out the shape with her finger. “Little Bear and Big Bear.”

He looked up at the night sky that was sprinkled with stars, more appearing every minute. “Do you know the names of everything up there?”

“Just about. I used to be able to name all 88 constellations in alphabetical order.”

He laughed and wrapped his arms around her waist. “You are such a nerd.”

“I know.”

“So which ones do you still remember?”

She leaned back against him. “Well,” she looked up at the sky, “there’s Perseus,” she pointed, “which reminds me the Perseid meteor shower peaks on the twelfth. We should come back up here.”

“Alright.” The softness in his voice made her tilt her head around so she could see him. He brushed her lips with his. “It’s a date.”

She was telling him the story of Cassiopeia when a van pulled into the car park and parked at the other end. A family piled out; a mom and dad, a grandpa, and three kids. The three kids ran around while the grandpa set up a telescope.

The kids were called over to look through the eye of the scope and were enthralled by the craters on the moon. Halla couldn’t help but smile as she heard one of the kids talk about wanting to be the first girl to walk on the moon. She turned to point out Pegasus, relaxed against Michael’s chest, when one of the kids heard her.

“Pegasus is up there?” the youngest girl called out.

Her mom called her back. “Leave the nice lady alone.”

“It’s alright, I don’t mind,” Halla called back. She walked over to where the little girl had stopped part way between her and her family. “There is a Pegasus in the stars.”  She sat down on the concrete next to the little girl so she would be on the same eye level. “See the big rectangle shape made by the stars?”

She spent the next few minutes helping the little girl see Pegasus. “Thank you, lady.” The little girl threw her arms around her neck, squeezed  and then ran back to her mother.

“Would you like to come look through the telescope?” the grandfather called out.

Michael and Halla spent the next few hours with the family, and once the oldest girl, Dahlia, a chatterbox with brown hair in a braid and a heavy fringe, found out that Halla worked at the observatory, she peppered Halla with questions about space and the moon and going to space and did she like Star Trek and were there really Vulcans out there, and a thousand other questions while Kyle stared at the motorbike until Michael finally asked him if he wanted to go look at it. Poppy, the littlest girl, kept handing Halla biscuits and then taking it away and running over to give the same biscuit to Michael. Her mother finally convinced her it was rude to take biscuits from people and Poppy then carried the packet of biscuits with her and doled them out with a very serious expression. She made sure that no one had an empty hand, whether they wanted one or not. Halla finally held on to a biscuit out of self-defense.

Poppy eventually crawled into her carseat and instantly fell asleep, signaling that the impromptu party was coming to an end. Halla and Michael bid them farewell, and Halla told Dahlia that if she ever came to the observatory to ask for her and she would give her a private tour and to please come some Tuesday to the viewing nights where they used the big 28 inch telescope.

Halla donned her helmet and climbed on the bike behind Michael. She settled in, her arms comfortable around his waist as they travelled back to London. She kept thinking about Dahlia’s interest in space and how much she had enjoyed talking with the girl about all the things she could do to learn more. She could feel Poppy’s arms around her neck still, and had three biscuits in the pocket of her hoodie. Kids weren’t too bad, she guessed, especially when you got to send them home at the end of the night with someone else. Still, it would be nice to have a daughter like Dahlia someday.

He walked her to her door in silence. Halla undid the lock and leaned in the entryway. “Thank you for the lovely outing. It was really sweet of you.”

He leaned his forearm against the doorframe above her and ran his fingers through her hair, smoothing out the mess the helmet had made of it. “I’m not sweet, I’m a caveman, remember?”

Icy fingers trailed down her spine at the memory of those sounds. “I don’t know, I think you might be both. Hard, hairy caveman exterior,” she let her nails scrape against the day’s worth of stubble on his chin, “soft, sweet interior.”

His hand dipped from her hair to her cheek and she pressed her face against it, closing her eyes. She felt his breath brush against her lips, the side of his nose stroke against hers, and she breathed him in before his lips closed over hers. She stood on tip toe in her candy pink Chucks as she kissed him back. His hand slid to the back of her neck as she leaned into him and wrapped her arms around his neck. She could smell the night air on him and the scent of fields of sun-warmed hay mixed with the tang of petrol and a whiff of cigarette smoke put her back out in that car park staring at the stars with his arms around her. He was warm against her chest instead of her back this time, and his arm slid down the door frame and wrapped around her back, pulling her firmly against him. Her lips parted under the tip of his tongue and she moaned softly against his mouth. He flicked his tongue against hers and she followed it into his mouth. He groaned softly and she ran her fingers through his short hair. The prickle against her fingers was a tangible reminder that this wasn’t Henry’s soft, thick curls running through her fingers as they kissed, but Michael’s short hair wasn’t, it was just new and different.

He finally pulled back from her and brushed the pad of his thumb against her slightly swollen bottom lip. “I’ll pick you up at seven for dinner?” His voice was ragged.

She nodded and took a deep breath to steady her trembling hands. “That sounds perfect.”

He tipped her chin up for one last kiss. “I’ll see you then.”


	29. Chapter Twenty-eight

August 7

Dinner Sunday had been lovely. He had booked them a quiet booth in the back of a restaurant that offered unobtrusive wait staff and delicious food. They’d lingered over their meal for hours and walked the streets of London for at least an hour after that. He had escorted her back to her flat and kissed her at the door and left. Halla had been surprised by that. She had expected him to try for a little bit more; not that his kisses didn’t leave her breathless and tingling, because they most certainly did, but he seemed content to leave her wanting.

He had a fancy dinner honoring someone she had never heard of to attend Monday night and she worked the Tuesday night viewing at the observatory, which had been more fun than she had expected. Dahlia had come with her mother, who confided that Dahlia had talked non-stop about going to the observatory since Saturday night. There were lots of other kids there who were fascinated by the images of distant galaxies the telescope provided. It had taken her quite a while when she had gotten home to calm down for the excited energy the children had filled her with.

Wednesday night they went to a play that she had never heard of. One of Michael’s friends was the lead, and while Michael thought it was fantastic, Halla had been less impressed. They had a late supper afterwards, and Michael explained why the performance was so wonderful. Halla wondered if this is what she sounded like when she was rhapsodizing about the mysteries of dark matter to someone who still thought Pluto was a planet.

He had asked her to come over to his place tonight and he was going to cook her dinner which Halla was greatly looking forward to. She had never seen him cook anything more complicated than toast when she had worked for him so she wasn’t sure what to expect. She had shaved her legs and put on a matching bra and knickers set that morning in expectation of things possibly getting more intimate than they had been. Now, however, she was pouring over huge print outs of data, brandishing a combination of highlighters in her left hand. A small sequence of numbers was highlighted yellow in regular intervals on the pages she had spread over the conference table, with a sparser, though still regular repeating interval of blue marks.

She was standing back, trying to gain some critical distance from the data patterns, her curled fingers brushing unheeded against her lips when her mobile rang. She found it under a pile of printouts and answered it.

“You coming over, Halla?”

It took her a second to recognize the voice. “Oh. OH! What time is it?”

“It’s eight.”

Her jaw dropped and she flipped around to look at the clock on the wall. “No! It was one just thirty minutes ago.”

“What’s got you’ve so distracted?”

Her brow wrinkled as she turned back to her yellow brick road of highlighted data. She was going to follow it to wherever it led. “I don’t know.”

“What?”

“I think I found something.”

“Like what?”

She scratched at her head. “I’m not sure yet. But something’s weird with this data from the Kepler that Cambridge gave us.”

“Weird good or weird bad?”

“Just weird. I think I’m seeing something that I can’t explain and I’m trying to wrap my brain around the potential causes and I’m not finding one that matches what I’m seeing.”

There was a short pause. “Why don’t we postpone dinner until tomorrow night?”

“Are you sure? You don’t mind?” Halla fought back the relief she was feeling at not having to put this project on hold.

“I’m disappointed I won’t see you, but your mind wouldn’t be on me if you came over. You’d be millions of miles away. You stay there, let your brain keep working on it, and I’ll see you tomorrow.”

She sighed in relief. “Thank you for understanding. You’re so sweet.”

“I’m really not that sweet.” When had she learned what his smirks sounded like?

“Whatever. I’ll be there tomorrow. I promise.”

“You better. Have fun solving your mystery.”

August 8

Halla showed up on his doorstep the next night and knocked on the door. She still had a key but didn’t think it would be appropriate to let herself in. Fassy opened the door and looked at her in surprise. “I wasn’t expecting you for at least another hour.”

She walked into the foyer and dropped her bag full of rolled printouts on the floor. “I knew if I went home first I would fall asleep and then I wouldn’t come over and that would be bad because I promised I would come over and I am really trying to keep my promises.”

She looked up at him and he saw the dark circles under her eyes that clashed with the radiant smile. “Are you alright?”

 She poked him in the chest and then left her hand there as she found him reassuringly steady. “I am wonderful. But I didn’t sleep last night so I am tired. Soooo tired. I’m still wearing my clothes from yesterday. Do I smell?”

He chuckled at the stream of words babbling from her mouth. “No, you’re fine. Why didn’t you sleep?”

“I found something. Something weird and I can’t explain it.”

“Well that’s no good.”

“No,” she poked him again, “it’s fantastic! We love things we can’t explain because it means we’re going to learn something new.” She flung her arms out to encompass the whole world.

“Who is this we?”

“Scientists! Science loves the unexplainable. Science is  _awesome_ that way. The weirder the better.” Her eyes were wide as she nodded her head in emphasis and tilted forward.

“Right. Baby, you’re swaying on your feet. I think you should probably lay down for a bit.”

“Alright.” She started into the living room but he turned her around. “Go lay down on a bed. Take your shoes off, get comfortable, I’ll bring you up a snack or something because I have the feeling you’ve eaten about as much as you’ve slept.”

“A snack would be nice.” She yawned and rubbed at her face as she headed up the stairs.

He came up to the guest room a few minutes later only to find it empty. A few more steps down the hall and he pushed open the door to his bedroom and smiled to find her sprawled face first on his bed. Her shoes were still on and her feet hung over the end of the bed as if she had just walked up to the bed and fallen over on it. He put the tea and biscuits on the nightstand and then sat on the foot of the bed and undid her shoes. She didn’t respond as he moved her higher on the bed and then drew a blanket over her. He closed the door as he left and fell back against it with a silent and frustrated laugh. This was definitely not how he had intended this evening to go.

August 9

Michael woke early in the morning to the sound of running water. She must be in the shower he decided. He stretched and slipped back into a doze until he heard her come out of his room and head down the hall. He followed after her a few minutes later and found her standing over the coffee pot in one of his shirts and what looked like a pair of his pants hanging out from under the hem.

“Good morning,” he murmured as he yawned and stretched again.

She turned around and smiled at him, somehow still looking sleepy after twelve straight hours of sleep. “I made enough for you, though I’m surprised you’re up already.”

“I thought that since I didn’t get to make you dinner, maybe I could make you breakfast. I can make toast or toast.”

She smiled at him over the rim of her mug. “I’m sorry for ruining our evening again.”

“I must admit I had hoped you might end up in my bed, but I had assumed I would be there with you.”

Her eyes widened as phantom fingers tickled against her ears. She wasn’t sure if he was serious, or if was flirting. Or both. “Where did you sleep?”

“In the guest room.”

She hadn’t meant to kick him out of his bed. She had just headed up the stairs and muscle memory had steered her into his bedroom. “I’m sorry. You should have woken me up.”

He grinned and leaned back against the kitchen wall. “I tried. You said, ‘I swear to god, I will shoot your corpse out of a torpedo tube if you touch me again.’”

Her jaw dropped in horrified amusement. “I did not!”

“You did.”

The only thing that was keeping her from melting through the floor in embarrassment was the amusement glittering in his eyes. “I’m so sorry.

He shrugged. “It worked. I didn’t touch you again.”

“Well,” she circled the rim of her mug with her fingertip, “consider the threat rescinded.” She looked up at him, her chest painfully tight, as he processed the full implication of her statement. She put down the coffee cup as he strolled across the kitchen to her, all bare chest and messy hair and stubble wrapped in a pair of pyjama pants that were putting up a valiant fight against gravity, barely holding onto his slim hips. She bit the inside of her lip as she watched. She had seen him like his before, but never with that look in his eyes. He was hungry and focused and she knew that he had just put her on his menu for breakfast.

His kiss was surprisingly gentle and Halla wrapped her arms around his neck. His hands closed around her waist and boosted her onto the counter and he stepped in between her knees. Michael brushed his lips gently against her jaw. “I really want to make love to you, Halla, but if you’re still getting over Henry–,”

She put her fingers against his lips. “Henry is my past.” She gasped as his tongue touched the tip of her finger and then he sucked it into his mouth. Her lips moved soundlessly for a few seconds. “I think,” her eyes rolled back as he sucked another one of her fingers into his mouth and then ran his tongue between them, “I think,” she tried again, “that I should focus on my future.”

Her breathing was already coming heavier than normal as her chest fought against the constriction threatening to suffocate her. His hands slid to her rear and pulled her closer to him. The thin cotton of his pyjamas did little to hide his growing erection as he pressed against the moist heat at her core. He drew his head back, pressing his tongue against the underside of her fingers. He finally let them drop from his mouth. “Am I part of your future, Halla?”

She focused on those eyes, the clear blue burning for her, blazing like a tropical sky. “I think you might be.”

“Good.” His mouth closed on hers once more and Halla leaned into him. This could work, she thought as he coaxed her lips open; the museum and maybe getting involved with the teaching programs there and Michael to come home to at night would be a wonderful life. She knew she was getting ahead of herself, but she was going to go to his bed without worrying about the awkward conversations they would have to have afterwards. She pushed thoughts of the future to the side as Michael made a compelling case for her to focus on the present. His hands slowly rubbed up and down her back until she felt limp against him. Her hands played over his shoulders and back, warm skin sliding under her fingers as she stroked him. She curved her fingers and gently dragged her nails across the skin, finding little give as the muscles resisted her incursion, his back rippling as he stretched under her like a cat being petted.

The image made her determined to get him to purr and she nipped at his bottom lip before kissing down his throat. The sandpaper stubble gave way to warm soft skin and she bit into the jugular. She could feel his pulse under her tongue as she licked at the mark and he groaned softly. She hummed in happiness. His throat had vibrated with the sound and she wanted him to do it again. She continued kissing down his throat and nipped at the skin and tugged and earned a guttural gasp in return.

He pulled up her shirt and she sat back long enough to help him pull it off. She leaned forward again but he shook his head, his lips pursed as he looked at her newly exposed skin. He bent and touched the tip of his tongue to her nipple. Her body jerked in surprise at the brief touch. “My turn,” he murmured before he gently licked her nipple again. Halla watched the deep pink of his tongue flick out against the paler pink of her nipple again and again as he slowly licked it to hardness before he sucked it into his mouth. She realized she was trying to dig her nails into the counter and forced her hands to relax before she broke a nail. She grabbed his head instead, not wanting him to be able to stop what he was doing. He pulled back enough to move to her other breast and he repeated his teasing touch with his tongue. Her nipple was already hardening before he licked it, and he brought it to a tight little pebble before he sucked it into his warm mouth, swirling his tongue around it before he tugged at it with his teeth. One of his hands went to her other breast, mimicking the motions of his mouth with his fingers as the other one splayed against her back, arching her against his mouth. Halla let her head fall back against the cabinet as she ran her nails against his scalp. Her lovers before had mostly skipped over her small breasts, never realizing how sensitive they actually were, and her chest tightened as she fought for breath against the thunderheads building in her stomach. Electricity was starting to shoot through her, sparking from her breasts and igniting a slow fire in her belly.

His hands fell to her hips and the rolled waistband of his boxers. She lifted up off the counter, bracing herself on her hands as he tugged them down. The soft fabric slid down her calves and fell to the floor and he stepped back between her legs, pulling her firmly against him. She rocked against the hard line of him, feeling the fabric dampen. He groaned and pushed her back just far enough for him to cup her mound his large hand. Halla whimpered as he touched her and then lifted her hips against his hand, wanting more than the mere presence of his hand. She wanted him to  _touch_  her.

Michael kissed across her chest and sucked the first nipple back into his mouth as he began to slide his finger up and down her slit. She tilted her hips trying to guide him, but his other hand stroked down her side and settled on her hip and held her still. His thumb traced her hip bone over and over as he held her steady. He pressed the middle finger of his other hand between the damp folds and teased her more, moving it in the same steady pattern as his thumb on her hip. She was whimpering as he raked his teeth against her nipple, and the sharp cry she made encouraged him to go on. He slipped his fingertip inside her and she cried his name for the first time. A surge of satisfaction raced through him and settled deep in his groin. It was more than satisfaction though. It was pride, and the payoff of poorly managed patience, and a little bit of territorial arrogance. She wanted him. After all that they had gone through, she had come back to him. He knew that it wasn’t that she had chosen him over Henry. He could still see the fading scars that breakup had left on her. But he had the capacity to make her happy in a way that Henry couldn’t, and she recognized that, and she wanted him to be her future.

He pressed his finger further inside her with each stroke, feeling her give way to him. She wasn’t holding on to him anymore. She seemed to have given up on that and was grabbing the edge of the counter instead. Even with his hand on her hip she kept trying to buck up and take more of him, but he wanted to take this nice and slow. Her words about the great sex with Henry haunted him and he was determined to replace any longing for Henry with cravings for himself.

He slowly stroked her over and over until he added a second finger to her pussy. Her wetness slicked his fingers and he slid inside her tightness with the perfect drag of skin on skin. He crooked his fingers and found that spot and she cried out his name again. He kissed his way back up her chest, licking into the hollow at the base of her throat that was adorned with a gold star and up her neck until he finally captured her mouth again. She wrapped her arms around his neck with a frantic desperation as she moaned into his mouth. His fingers curled and coiled inside her and he added his thumb to her clit. She sobbed against him and her head fell back against the cabinet again as she squirmed under his touch. She was trying so hard to get exactly what she wanted that her torso started rocking back and forth.

“Michael, please,” she begged him, forcing her eyes open to see him watching her. Her face flamed under the look he was giving her. He was breathing across parted lips and was watching the slide of his fingers in and out of her with an intense fascination. She looked down her body, past her nipples hard and wet and the color of raspberries to where his hand were, one on her hip, thumb still stroking her skin, and the other one between her thighs. She hooked her heels behind his thighs and pulled. He stood firm though, and their eyes met. He could see her breasts heaving and the color high in her cheeks like flags of a surrendering army. She was biting the side of her bottom lip, so spent that she couldn’t think of anything else to say except his name and please.

His hand flew from her hip to the nape of her neck and he bit her lip for her before his tongue found hers again. She was making a string of needy noises that filled his ears like a sweet soundtrack and he started to press harder, circle faster, slide a little deeper. Her hips, now free to move, matched his tempo and her nails dug into shoulders with no remorse.

Halla could feel her orgasm starting to build with the inevitable force of an avalanche. Her muscles started to tense, her thighs were trembling, her hips stopped moving and just stayed arched up off the counter as she dug her heels into the back of his thighs. “Oh, god, Michael!” she cried one last time as it hit. Lights flashed behind her eyelids as she clung to him, rigid with the force of the pleasure coursing through her before she started to shake.

Michael stroked her through it, feeling her pussy convulse around his fingers. He softened his touch against her clit, but kept his thumb moving against the sensitive little nub until she had relaxed back to where she was sitting on the counter again and she could keep her eyes open for more than a few seconds at a time.

He removed his hand from her and slowly licked his fingers while she watched him. Her breath was still coming in labored gasps and he said, “You taste like heaven.”

She made a noise somewhere between a moan and a laugh. He smirked as he pulled his finger from his mouth and dropped to his knees and pulled her forward, hooking her thighs over his shoulders. She shrieked in surprise at the sudden movement but then he touched his tongue to her clit and she moaned, a high-pitched wordless surrender, and he painted a stripe up her wet skin with his tongue. She grabbed at his head, gently holding him against her, her fingers drawing small circles in his hair. Michael dipped his tongue into her, feeling her heat give way to his intrusion. She moaned softly and he looked up at her to see her head leaning back against the cabinet, eyes closed, and her tongue slowly retreating into her mouth, releasing her bottom lip back to its normal fullness.

He used his thumbs to hold her open, fully exposing her clit to his touch. He circled around it and then back down to her pussy, pressing inside, curling his tongue like he had his fingers earlier, before returning to her clit, closer to it each time. She was rocking against him, trying to guide him by the time he finally gave her what she was craving.  He lapped at her clit and her nails scraped against his scalp; he licked again and she moaned softly. He settled in to a steady motion, his tongue in constant movement against the swollen nub and she guided him right where she wanted him, pressing up her hips and then pressing his head against her. Her breath turned into a steady string of senseless syllables, scaling an octave as he brought her closer and closer to another orgasm. He could feel her thighs trembling on his shoulders and knew she was moments away from igniting again.

Halla ground her hips against him again, the coarse rub of his stubble deliciously rough against her sensitive flesh. His tongue had her quivering under its steady flick and he had honed in on the exact right spot to make her explode. Her toes curled as her heels climbed his back, trying to find enough leverage so that she could press herself even closer to his scalding mouth. Halla’s head dropped off the bottom of the cabinet with a jolt as her hips worked their way forward on the countertop. She let it fall back and rested on her elbows, her entire body straining forward, upward, needing to find that one fleeting touch that would slice through the rope pulling every nerve in her body taut, pulling her closer and closer, and then he scraped his teeth gently over her clit and she screamed as the rope snapped and all that tension shot loose and spilled down her nerves like a fire hose turned on full pressure. She cried his name again as her body convulsed and he held her steady and lazily licked at her core until she could stop shaking and gasping for breath.

She was practically falling off the counter and he picked her up in his arms and headed for his bedroom. He might bring her to orgasm for the first time in the kitchen, but he would be damned if their first time making love was going to be against a wall. The weight of her in his arms made him remember that morning in Rotterdam where he had rescued her from the shower. This was going to be so different though. This wasn’t going to be about pain and guilt and sorrow. This was going to be about pleasure and happiness and he refused to voice, even mentally, the other word that was starting to form in his brain. For right now, this was enough.

He placed her carefully on his bed and knelt over her. Her hair feathered out against the dark linens and he kissed her softly. “Do you want to keep going?”

“I have one question.”

“What’s that?” He brushed his thumb across the faint lines creasing her forehead.

“Was that a prosthetic penis in  _Shame_?”

His laughter filled the bedroom. “No, it was real. Don’t worry, I know what I’m doing.”

“I certainly hope so.”

He stretched out next to her on the bed and she rolled over on her side to face him. He brushed her hair back from her face, damp little tendrils that were clinging to her forehead. She was still flushed and glowing and she had never appeared more beautiful to him. He slid his hand to the back of her head and leaned in to kiss her. Her arms worked their way around his neck as their mouths moved against each other. His hand slid down her back and then up over her hip and he draped her leg over him, and then rocked up against her. Her breath hitched and he moved against her again. Her leg tightened around him and their hips ground against each other as they continued to kiss.

He broke their kiss and looked at her, pulling back just far enough to let his eyes focus. “Tell me you want this, Halla.”

“I want this.” She traced the line of his jaw with her fingers, rough against smooth. “I want you, Michael.”

He grabbed her hand and kissed her fingertips and then stood long enough to shed his pyjamas and grab a condom from the nightstand. Halla watched him roll it on with a bit of trepidation. He saw her eyes widen and crawled his way up her body, his movements drawing her eyes to his. He kissed her firmly. “I told you don’t worry.”

“But, um, have you seen your penis?”

He laughed again. “Yes, I have.”

“Alright, just checking. I’m going to trust you here.”

He pressed one knee in between her legs. “Good.” He bent to kiss her again, drawn back to her mouth over and over like a bee to nectar. He lowered himself onto his elbows as they kissed and he felt her relax underneath him. Her hands moved slowly across his back as his sought out her breasts, teasing them back into firm peaks. Her hands finally settled on his lower back and she pulled him closer and he pressed his other knee between her legs.

She linked her legs around him, her feet resting in the bend of his knees. He guided his cock to her entrance and paused to nip at her bottom lip. “Stop worrying, baby.”

She huffed out a laugh and he took her mouth again as he started to press inside her. They were slow dancing on a summer night, warm and languid and moving to a rhythm that only they could hear. He would pull pack and then press forward and she would follow his lead, moving together as they moved against each other. Time was measured in moans and sighs instead of minutes and seconds and they didn’t stop when he was fully sheathed inside her but kept moving together. Her hands moved from his lower back only to be replaced by her ankles as she locked her legs around him.

He couldn’t get enough of her; her sweet kisses, the softness of her breasts, and the stretch of her pussy tight around his thrusting cock; the grind of her hips against his, the sound of his name on her tongue. He was aching with the need to come but he was not going to do that until she came once more. He wanted this to be perfect for her, for them; he needed this to be right so that he could put the stuttering starts and hiccupping halts behind him. He wanted that part to be over so that they could start something new together.

He focused on that as he rested on his elbows over her, thrusting into her with all the precision and efficiency of German engineering. He was going to bring her to pieces one more time before he took his own pleasure. He slid his hand down her body, squeezing her breast, trailing down her stomach, before finding her clit, swollen and soaking wet and, from the way her entire body jerked when he touched it, incredibly sensitive. He gently stroked it, deft little circles that had her nails digging into his shoulders within a minute. She quivered and arched her hips up against him, gyrating against his touch.

He gasped for breath as he quickened the pace he was keeping, pistoning his hips, and her head fell back against the pillow, a shattered cry forcing its way from her throat. Halla’s body went taut under his before she shook, and her pussy clenched repeatedly around his cock. She was so beautiful that he almost wanted to stop, even though he was on the cusp of his own orgasm, simply to watch her bask in the afterglow as little tremors continue to ripple through her, but he was too close to his own to pause now. He levered himself up on his knees and grabbed her hips, holding her steady as he grunted out three or four more deep, soul rending thrusts and came, howling her name at the ceiling.

He sprawled on the bed next to her and panted like a wild animal as he tried to regain some semblance of normalcy.

“I think I’m going to take it back,” she said.

He looked at her out of the corner of his eye, too winded to even let his head flop over to the side.

“Take back what?”

“That wasn’t sweet. That was pure caveman.” His heart lurched for a second until she started laughing.

He grabbed her around the waist and pulled her against him. “Mmhmmm, of course, now that I’ve dragged you back to my cave I’m not going to let you go.”

She covered her face with the back of her hand while she yawned. “That’s okay by me,” she managed to get out around the yawn. She burrowed into his side and rested her head against his chest. “I’m going to sleep now.”

“Sleep as long as you want. I’ll be here when you wake.” He kissed the top of her head and fell asleep with her in the bed she had kicked him out of so many times before. The last thought that went through his mind before sleep claimed him was if she was still going to make him wear pyjamas.


	30. Chapter Twenty-nine

It was almost noon by the time Michael and Halla finally got around to eating. Halla put Michael in charge of buttering toast while she scrambled a dozen eggs. Her stomach gnawed on her spine as she bit into an apple while she stirred the eggs to keep them from browning. When they sat down to the table, she fell on her food like the locusts of Egypt. Michael watched in amusement as he ate his breakfast. He had forgotten how much she was capable of eating in one go especially for how tiny she was; it was like she was part hummingbird. When she showed signs of slowing, he asked, “So, what’s so exciting about those rolls of printouts that you weren’t eating or sleeping?”

“I found something odd, and I’m not sure what it is.” She reached for another piece of toast.

“So what happens now?”

“Well, I wrote up all my observations, emailed them to myself and got a printout notarized, just to be able to certify when I made them, and then I emailed the head of the lab in Cambridge who let me have the data, and said that I thought I had found something odd and when he had time could we chat, and he rang me up and we went over the data together and he agrees there’s something odd, so he was going to email his friends who actually work with that type of data, because neither of us are experts at relativistic beaming analysis.” She gasped, dropped her fork, and darted to where her bag lay on the floor in the entry way and pawed through it for her mobile. She yanked it out, tapped the screen and her short high pitched squeal pierced the quiet. “Do you have a charger?” she called, panic entwined around her words like ivy on a crumbling stone tower.

She sat cross-legged on the floor scrolling through a message until Michael handed her his charger. She took it without looking up, plugged it into her mobile and then crawled over to the wall and fumbled the other end into an outlet while she kept reading. Michael watched her patiently. He recognized the look on her face as she sat there reading. That was the ‘I just got a call from my agent telling me I landed my first big role’ face.

She looked up at him from her position on the floor, color draining from her face as her phone dropped unheeded into her lap. “They’re moving arrays.”

He squatted in front of her and took her trembling hands in his. “I don’t know what that means.”

“You’ve seen the enormous fields of radar dishes?”

He nodded.

“That’s an array. They’re retargeting the one at Cambridge and the NRAO one in New Mexico to get more data. They agree there’s something going on and everyone wants to figure out what’s causing,” she paused and swallowed loudly as tears filled her eyes, “the Jónsdóttir Anomaly.”

A smile spread across his face as he sat down and pulled her into a hug. “That’s fantastic. There’s something in space named after you. I won’t have to call you Hubble anymore.”

She crawled into his lap and rested against him. Her heart was racing almost as fast as her thoughts about what had happened and she needed to feel safe for a few moments before she took this next leap. He rubbed her back and arms, her pulse thrumming under his hands.

“He wants me to come back,” she said quietly.

“Who?”

“The director of the observatory in Cambridge. He wants me to come back and do the analysis of the data that they get to finish up my fellowship.”

“That’s wonderful.” He tilted her face up to his when she didn’t respond. “Right?”

Halla twisted, trying to climb off his lap. “Oh my god I’m going to be sick.”

“No. No you’re not.” He grabbed her hands and kept her from fleeing. “You are going to be amazing. You found something that no one else did, just you and your brain. You proved that you can do this already; now is just your victory lap.”

“What if I mess up?” Her eyes were so wide he could see the white all the way around the iris.

He clasped her face between his hands. “Then you mess up. We all mess up. You apologize and pick yourself up and keep going.”

“What if I drink?” Cambridge was where her life had started going off the rails. How could she possibly go back there and put herself under that kind of stress again? It was just asking for a disaster to happen.

“You’re not going to drink. Don’t even put that out there. If you feel yourself wobbling, you have so many people you can call on. Especially me.”

“But I’m going to have to move. You won’t be there.”

He smiled at her, trying to get her to see beyond the panic currently gripping her every thought. “This is the Cambridge a few hours up the road you’re moving to, not the one across the ocean, right?”

“Well, yes,” she said, logic starting to sneak into the spaces fear had abandoned.

“I can be there when you need me.”

Her hand tightened on his arm. “Really?”

“Of course.”

She let her head fall against his shoulder. “We were just getting started.”

“We  _are_  just getting started. Unless you want to call this off now.”

“But,” her forehead crinkled in confusion, “I’ll be in Cambridge.”

Halla watched the laugh lines appear around his eyes as he gently touched her cheek. “And there will be periods of time where I’ll be on another continent. We’ll try and make it work. And if it doesn’t, then it doesn’t. But I think we ought to at least try.”

“I swear I’m not running away this time. I just can’t pass this up.”

“Of course you can’t. This is your Oscar-winning role. Now, explain to me what exactly you found in very small words so I can brag on you to other people.”

She laughed and hugged him tightly. She had not been expecting this level of support from him, especially not as tentative as their brand new relationship was. She kissed him soundly before she settled back down on his lap to explain her discovery.

Halla laughed and pulled one of the rolls of paper out of her bag and spread it out on the tile, weighting down the ends with her bag and her mobile. “Look at this row of numbers. That’s the amount of radiation, let’s just call it light, that the Kepler was reading from the star I was looking at.”

“It’s all the same number. I thought stars twinkled.”

She nodded. “No. That’s just atmospheric interference. The same numbers reading after reading means we’re getting a strong, uninterrupted signal from that star, until we get to here.” She pointed at one of the cells she had highlighted yellow.

“The number got smaller, so the satellite received less light.”

“Right. Something passed between the satellite and the star.”

He looked over at her, but she was concentrating on the chart in front of her, her brow furrowed as if she thought hard enough, the numbers would reveal the mysteries of the universe to her. His chest tightened painfully as he realized they probably would. He couldn’t help but wonder what it must be like to have a brain that could turn numbers into the creation of the universe. She had been wasted as his assistant. “Like what? Another planet?”

“Probably. But it’s weird, because planets follow pretty steady orbits.”

He turned back to the data laid out on the floor of his entryway. She was going to need a workspace, he realized, as he glanced at the rolls of printout she had poking from her bag. “Well, the yellow cells look like they are showing up regularly, so is that its orbit? It’s passing in front of the star.”

“Exactly. Gold star for you.”

“So you found a planet?” He was proud of himself for keeping up with her, and tried not to think about how much she was dumbing this down for him.

“Well, that’s why I said probably, because look at the blue cells.” She rolled out more of the printout. The museum didn’t have one of the roll printers the research labs did, so she had printed it out a page at a time and cut and taped the pages together to make a long chart she could easily examine for patterns.

“They’re all over. It’s like they’re randomly scattered.”

“Ooooh, that’s good. I wonder how close to random they are.” She grabbed a pen from her bag and carefully wrote ‘check for true randomness’ on the margin of the paper. “That’s what’s weird, though. The blue cell is a decrease in the amount of radiation we’re getting, but it’s never the same decrease, and it’s never for the same time period.”

His chest had puffed out a bit as she had taken his question seriously, and though he had no idea how to check for true randomness, apparently she did. “So, what causes that?”

She shrugged and looked back at the paper. “I don’t know. It could be another planet but that’s unlikely with how stable the star is. It could be something out past the probable first planet that’s pulling on it, but the irregular intervals are weird. It would be like earth suddenly having a 14 month year all of a sudden.”

“What would cause that to happen?”

She scratched at her head with the capped end of her pen as she chewed on her bottom lip. She chewed on the center of it when she was thinking, he noticed, as opposed to biting the corner of it when she was turned on. “Ummm, Jupiter getting a whole hell of a lot larger, maybe?”

“Jupiter affects the earth’s orbit?” He did not remember this from primary school.

“A little bit. Anything with enough mass will affect the earth’s orbit. The moon affects the earth’s orbit. Really strong jet stream winds will slow the earth down. That huge earthquake that caused the tsunami in the Indian Ocean several years ago actually threw the earth out of orbit enough that they had to adjust the atomic clocks. It was a fraction of a second, but still.”

“Really?” Why did they not teach all this stuff in school? This was much cooler than memorizing the planets in order.

She nodded again. “You know how the earth is round?”

He nodded.

“Well, it’s not.” She giggled, taking an inappropriate amount of joy from the increasing amounts of disbelief flashing across his face.

His eyes narrowed. Now she was just making stuff up. “What?”

She was mostly successful in her attempt not to laugh. “It’s not. Cross my heart.” She made the childhood motion. “It’s kind of bulgy.”

“Bulgy doesn’t sound very scientific.”

“No, but you told me to use small words. You know how the moon causes ocean tides, right?” He nodded. That one he was aware of. “The moon pulls huge amounts of water around the earth and gives it tides because of its gravitational pull on the earth.”

“So,” he thought for a moment, “if the moon got bigger, we’d get bigger tides?”

“Right. Which is why I  _hate_  the ending of  _Fifth Element._ It was a great movie and then they basically put another moon into orbit around the earth and acted like they were saving the world when that would probably destroy life as we know it.” She jerked her pen around as she talked and her normally pale skin turned a blotchy red.

He could practically see the steam issuing from her ears as she seethed over the inaccurate science in the movie. “You’re going to be fun to watch science fiction movies with, aren’t you?”

She took a deep breath and looked at him out of the corner of her eyes, a bit embarrassed by her sudden tirade. “A blast.”

“Let me see if I have this right. It looks like you found a planet, but something that you can’t detect is pulling on it with enough gravity to affect its orbit.”

She bounced a little where she sat. “Yes! And until we can find out what that thing is, we can’t be positive it’s really a planet being affected.”

“So, you found an invisible planet and a normal planet. That’s like two for one. Do you get a Nobel for that?”

She leaned over and knocked on the leg of the wooden entry table. “If I can actually prove the existence of invisible planets, maybe. Someday.” Her hand went up to the necklace at her throat. “That’s way way waaaaaaaay down the road, though.”

He looked back at the roll of data unfurled on the floor. He had meant it as a joke, but she seemed to take it seriously. The immensity of what she was doing was slowly starting to sink in. He knew she was fascinated with space and had studied astrophysics. He had not comprehended the level at which she was working, even while not officially doing original research. “I don’t know how to put this without sounding rude, but why did you see this and no one else did? Surely someone else is looking at this data too, right?” She was going to need her own office, not just a workspace, even if she would just be here on weekends. He knew how he got when he was neck-deep in a script, and he knew from the last few days she would be the same way as data started coming in. Even during their days together, she would be sneaking in hours to go stare at sheets full of numbers that didn’t mean anything to him, but told her stories of distant stars and unknown planets.

“Well, say you lose your keys. Where do you look first?”

“In the trousers I wore the day before.”

Her head cocked to the side, and she tapped her pen against her chin. “Why don’t you look on the ceiling?”

“Because keys have never been on the ceiling. It wouldn’t make sense to look there.”

“Right. There is so much  _stuff_  out there,” she waved her hands expansively, “and we have limited resources so we look for the things that we know are likely to be there. Physics works by defining laws and matter follows certain rules of behavior, and we look for the patterns those laws and rules predict to identify objects worthy of investigation. The problem is that this anomaly only follows the rules some of the time, so with a computer be coded for low levels of variance toleration, it would ignore this as noise instead of signal. I was looking at hardcopy printouts rather than having the computer analyze the data so I saw the sometimes pattern.”

He had a wicked smirk on his face as he looked at her. “You’re hot when you’re nerdy,” he said, his voice gravelly under the smooth tone.

Her cheeks flushed as she smiled. “You’re hot all the time.”

“Come here. It’s been too long since I kissed you.”

She laughed at his demand but gladly gave him the kiss he asked for. She got the giggles as she tried to crawl into his lap at the same time as he was attempting to pull off her shirt and her elbows caught the fabric, pinning her arms awkwardly against her face. “Hold still, woman,” he growled.

“Caveman,” she stuck out her tongue but stopped trying to turn around.

He tossed her shirt over his shoulder and then helped her move so she was straddling his legs, her feet resting on the tops of his thighs. His hands settled on her rear, kneading her arse through the thin fabricas she wrapped her arms around his neck. She could feel him hardening against the damp heat between her legs as they kissed and let Michael’s hands guide her into a steady grind against him. She gathered his shirt into her hands as they rested on his shoulders until she could quickly pull it off of him without having to stop the feel of his lips against hers for any more than absolutely necessary.

She had no idea how she had resisted the beauty of his body every morning for weeks. His chest was a textbook illustration for masculine beauty, lean and chiseled. She leaned back so she could watch as her fingers trailed down his stomach, tracing each path eroded into the muscles through the runoff of sweat.

She looked up at him and bit her lip as her hand went further afield and cupped him through the front of his jeans. His eyes closed and his jaw firmed as she steadily stroked him through the confining denim. She could feel him getting even harder as she massaged his cock. His hips twitched uncontrollably as she squeezed and she whispered in his ear, “Looks like my caveman isn’t as nearly in charge as he thinks he is.”

He surged to his feet as he grabbed her hips to keep from dropping her. Once he regained his balance he threw her over his shoulder and marched up the stairs to the sound of her laughing. “I think I’m in trouble now.”

“I think you  _are_ trouble,” he said as he delivered a swift swat on her bum.

“At least you’ll never be bored.” She dipped her hand inside the back of his jeans and pinched his rear.

He set her on her feet on his bed and she grabbed his shoulders to keep her balance. He stripped her shorts off of her and slipped a hand between her thighs, plunging a finger inside her and her fingers dug into his shoulders as she cried out in surprise. He started stroking his finger in and out as she panted, trying to regain her thoughts.

“Do you really want to play who’s in charge with me?” He flicked his tongue against her nipple.

“I don’t mind losing as long as the game is fun,” she gasped out.

“Oh I think we’ll have fun.” He licked her nipple again before sucking it into his mouth. He rolled the nipple with his tongue as he continued sliding his finger in and out of her pussy. He added a second finger to the first and wrapped his free arm firmly around her back to keep her upright as her knees buckled.

Halla slid one hand to his head, holding his mouth to her breast as she bucked against his hand. His fingers played in and out of her, crooking and hitting that spot with each push. He spread his fingers open inside her and she moaned each time in sweet anticipation of when it would be his cock doing the stretching. She slumped against him, trusting his arm to keep her upright as he brought her surely to her climax. Her voice didn’t even sound like her own as she called his name again and again as he stroked her clit. Her boneless liquidity started to harden into iron as her muscles drew taut, her thighs growing rigid as she ground against his hand. His teeth raked over her nipple and her head fell back, letting loose a moan of delight, releasing some of the pressure building in her to keep from exploding.

The muscles in her stomach quivered as she rocked against him and Michael pressed a third finger inside of her and stretched and she cried out his name and her fingers dug into his shoulder and scalp. He ignored the sting of her nails and tightened his arm around her as she came, keeping her in place so he could continue stroking her as she clamped around his fingers. She clung to him as she shook, murmuring his name repeatedly.

He knelt on the bed and lowered her onto her back, kissing her body repeatedly as he worked his way back down. He stood and shed his jeans and grabbed a condom. She watched him put it on, her breath catching in her throat at the sight of him carefully unrolling it down the length of his cock. “How did I get so lucky as to convince you to take a chance on me?”

He crawled back up on the bed and kissed her. “I think it was calling me fuckweed that really sealed the deal.” She laughed and he kissed her neck. “It’s the German-Irish heritage. We don’t go for normal flirtation.”

“I’ll remember that for the future.”

He rolled her over onto her stomach and brushed his lips against the nape of her neck, nuzzling her hair out of the way to expose the delicate flesh to his mouth. He sucked at the skin enough to leave a mark where no one else would find it before he started to kiss down her spine. He took his time to learn her body, licking and kissing and biting down the strong column of her body as his hands kept time with his mouth, stroking down her sides.  He pressed a kiss into the small of her back as his hands gripped her hips, pulling her rear higher as he straddled her legs. He grabbed his cock in his hand and guided it to her pussy, stroking up and down and getting it coated with her wetness before letting it brush against the opening. She pushed back against him and he pressed slowly inside her until he was buried, watching her face as she reacted to his claiming. Her mouth fell open at first and then her teeth sank into the corner of her bottom lip that he had kissed to a deep pink. He couldn’t see her eyes as her hair had fallen over them when he had rolled her over. He leaned forward and licked a line from her chin to her ear as he brushed her hair back. He wanted to see every flicker of emotion and sensation cross her face.

He started to move within her, long deep strokes that had her moaning in time with every thrust. He pushed an arm between her and the sheet, grabbing her breast and squeezing it. Her head arched back and she grabbed his thigh with her hand. She stuttered out his name as he pinched her nipple and rolled it between his fingers.  Halla scratched her nails against Michael’s thigh, feeling the muscles moving with each thrust of his cock inside her. He clamped his hand over hers, holding her body tautly drawn as he moved his hand from her breast to her clit. Her whimpering moans were matched by his harsh breathing as he slammed into her. Halla bit her lip as she felt the familiar tension building again, coiling like a spring. “Michael, please!” she cried out as her toes curled. She reached up and braced her hand against the headboard, giving herself some leverage so she could push back against him. He let go of her hand and wrapped his hand around one of the headboard railings so he could pull with even more force. His hips snapped forward, driving her higher, and she screamed into the mattress as she came, her voice joining the rough sound of his breathing and the echoes of his body pounding against hers in the quiet room.

He came with her, the feel of her body hard and tight around him, gripping his cock, clenching over and over as her head snapped back and she cried out again, pulling it from him with no reluctance on his part. He dropped forward onto his hands and he finished out the last few grunting thrusts and then collapsed over her, pressing kisses to her hair.

He finally rolled off of her and she turned over onto her back. “Alright. You may have been the one in charge, but I think I’m the real winner here.”

He rested his head on her chest and draped an arm across her stomach, resting his hand on the curve of her thigh. “As long as you keep thinking that, we’ll be fine.”


	31. Chapter Thirty

_One year later_

_August 12, 2015_

The constant chatter of vendors blended with the smell of roasting meats and exotic spices as Halla wandered through the stalls of Portabello Market, waiting for something to inspire her. Her mind spun as it attempted to process the cacophony of the vendors hawking their wares, praising the colors and scents of the fresh fruits and vegetables. She sipped her coffee and nibbled absentmindedly at the pastry in her hand as she tried to decide what to buy. She was about to go back to that stall she had passed with the gorgeous cherries and buy a bag instead of baking dessert when a familiar figure caught her eye. She strolled to the stall three vendors down and said, “Hey, Superman.”

Henry turned around and a grin spread across his face as he saw her. “Hey, Barbie.” He swept her up into a hug. “Fancy seeing you here.”

She hugged him tightly before he set her back on her feet. “I’m closer to home than you are these days.”

He pulled on the collar of his shirt, tugging it back into place. “I guess that’s true. Nora’s never been to London before, and she loves the movie  _Notting Hill_ , so I thought I would bring her to see the real thing while we were in England.”

“Nora?”

He grinned and turned around. “Nora, there’s someone I want you to meet,” he called. A woman stood from where she was squatting next to a crate of nectarines. She was pretty, with light brown hair that waved down her back, streaked blonde in a way that was only achieved by long hours spent outdoors. She smiled at Henry and Halla watched his face soften as he returned the smile. He slipped his arm around her waist as she joined them. “Nora, this is Halla. Halla, this is my girlfriend Nora.”

“It’s so nice to meet you.” Nora reached out her hand as Halla went to hug her and they awkwardly bumped into each other. “I hug everyone,” Halla said with a grin.

Nora smiled politely and hugged her in return.

“I’ve heard so much about you,” Nora said as she relaxed against Henry’s side and put her arm around his waist.

“Oh, that’s never a good sign,” Halla said, wondering what Henry had told this woman about their complicated past.

Nora dismissed her concerns with the wave of a hand. “Don’t worry. I heard about how you’re finding weird stuff in space.”

“I just wish I could figure out what it is.”

“Still no idea?” Henry asked. She had emailed him the initial article in  _Science_ discussing the Jónsdóttir Anomaly. Her e-mail had simply said, “I don’t think it’s the Krypton home world, but I found something.” He’d emailed her back congratulations but they hadn’t talked since then and she and Michael had skipped the London premiere of the  _Superman_ sequel a few weeks earlier.

“No, but no one else has figured it out yet either, so I don’t feel too dumb. We know something or some things out there is exerting a gravitational pull on the planet I found, but it also doesn’t seem to have mass that blocks any form of energy on the visible or non-visible spectrums. So of course, the easiest answer is a cloaked Romulan Warbird, but radio messages sent in Romulan, Klingon and Vulcan haven’t garnered a response.” She giggled and tucked her hair behind her ear. “Yet. I mean, it is two thousand light years away.”

Henry’s mouth dropped open a bit as he scratched at his jaw. “You did  _not_ send out a message in Klingon.” His head cocked to the side as lines appeared between his brows.

“ _I_ didn’t, but that doesn’t mean drunken researchers at one or more research facilities have not attempted to contact the supposed cloaked vehicle,” she coughed into her hand, “while I watched,” she muttered.

His eyes narrowed. “Were you,” he trailed off but made a drinking motion with his hand.

She laughed. “No. I was drinking sparkling water. It was the group of us who had just been hooded and we had been out celebrating all night we ended up back in the lab trying to contact aliens with incredibly expensive machinery.”

Henry chuckled. “You seem really happy. You got your dream.” He touched the gold star at her throat with a single fingertip.

“I did. And your new  _Superman_ movie has set all sorts of box office records. It seems like we’re both getting what we wanted most.” Her eyes fell on Nora. “I’m sorry. We’re totally ignoring you. So, do you act too?”

Nora recoiled like she had been presented with a viper. “Oh no. I could never get up in front of people like that. I just cook.”

“You’re a chef,” Henry corrected her.

Halla laughed. “You found the woman of your dreams, Henry. Someone who can keep up with your unending appetite.”

His arm tightened around Nora’s waist as he looked at her. “I really did.” She smiled up at him and he kissed her on the tip of her nose. His gaze lingered on Nora for a few more moments and then he turned back to Halla. “So now that you’ve graduated, are you moving back to London?”

“I’m staying on as a post-doctoral research fellow. Still need to figure out what’s going on up there, you know? I’m just down for a few days. I’m trying to figure out what to bake this afternoon that will transport easily. Michael and I are going up to Leith Hill tonight to watch the meteor shower and he has nothing in the house and to make it worse, it has to fit in the saddlebags on his motorcycle without getting squashed.”

Nora smiled. “Shortbread with dark chocolate chunks and roasted chopped nuts. Pound cake with some sort of summer berry in it, and then a bag of cherries,” she rattled off.

Halla looked at Nora in surprise, then to Henry, and back to Nora. “I love you.” She leaned in and whispered conspiratorially, “I don’t suppose you have recipes memorized, do you?”

“Not memorized, no, but give me your email address and I’ll send them over in a few hours. I’ve got everything stored online.”

Halla jotted down her email address on the receipt for her coffee and handed it to her. “Thank you. I was so overwhelmed by all the options I couldn’t narrow it down.”

“It’s my pleasure.”

“Well, I guess I should go finish my shopping. It was really nice to meet you, Nora. And it was good to see you again, Henry.”

“You too, Halla.” He kissed her on the cheek and she hugged him and then hugged Nora.

“I’m glad he found you,” she whispered.

She continued down the crowded passage between the stalls and then looked back over her shoulder. They were walking away, Henry’s hand still around her waist. He turned and looked at her and lifted his chin in acknowledgement. She waved once and he waved back before he turned and said something to Nora.

Halla was just taking the pound cake out of the oven when Michael got home. “Something smells fantastic.” He walked into the kitchen and kissed the top of her head. “What’s got you being all domestic?”

“I was thinking it would be nice to have a snack when we’re up out watching stars tonight.” She popped one of the left over raspberries into his mouth.

“Speaking of stars,” he handed her a Waterstones bag, “I got you a little something.” She pulled a heavy book from the bag and then looked up at him in confusion. “You bought me a book about space?” There was a smile on his face that meant she was missing something.

“It’s not just any book on space. Flip to page three hundred fifty.”

She flipped open the hard cover and thumbed through the heavy glossy pages, trying not to get distracted by the beautiful photographs. She found the page and her eyes skimmed over the words until they caught on her name. She looked up at Michael is surprise and saw a huge grin on his face.

“I’m in a book!”

“Yes you are, baby.” She wasn’t looking at him still, her attention already drawn back to the text. The section was on new frontiers in space research and discussed the early results of the data gathered about her eponymous anomaly.

She slowly closed the book after she had read through the section several times and clutched it to her chest. “I’m in a book. That makes it real.”

He bent and kissed her. “That’s just the first of many books you’ll be in. Someday they’ll have to shelf you in the biography section.”

She put an arm around him, the other arm still wrapped firmly around the book. “I love you. I know what we have isn’t easy, but the time we have together is worth all the sacrifices.”

“I have an idea about how to make it easier. Turn to the back cover.”

She opened the back of the book and found a key stuck to it. “A key?”

“I borrowed it from a realty agent. I found a house in Letchworth that I want you to go look at with me.” Halla’s hand tightened around the key. She had been offered the post-doctoral fellowship three months prior and they had talked about possibly finding a flat half way between Cambridge and London. She had seen him surfing real estate websites in the last month, but she didn’t realize he was actually looking at properties, especially not an actual house. “It’s a big old place,” he continued, “but it’s been renovated recently. There’s an en-suite with a tub so large that you could probably swim in it, and skylights and a fireplace in the bedroom, and a big garden with tall hedges for plenty of privacy. I think it would be dark enough for you to put a telescope out there and get good results. And it’s close to the train station, and I checked and it’s less than forty minutes to Cambridge, and you don’t have to change trains.”

“It sounds wonderful.” It sounded perfect actually. She had gotten used to riding the train to London on Friday nights and back Monday mornings. Forty minutes would be the perfect amount of time to check her email and Twitter before getting to work in the morning, and enough time to relax before she got home each night. Her body flushed with warmth like she was back in the August sunshine.

“Do you want to go look at it tomorrow with me?”

“Of course I will. Just,” she scratched at her forehead, “why did you put the key in the book?”

“You get more excited about things that are in space.”  The corners of his mouth turned up the slightest bit as he fought to not grin, but the lines around his eyes amplified the mischief dancing there.

Halla rolled her eyes but she laughed. “You are such a dork.”

He grinned at her and then brushed the pad of his thumb across her bottom lip. “I bet you don’t call me a dork when I do that with a ring some day.”

 

_The End_


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